As the five of them walked down the stairs toward the morgue at the police station, Eric strove to catch up to Chloe who was leading the way. There'd been something that had bothered him since he found himself locked in the back of a police car with nothing better to do than study the people who sat up front. "I've been meaning to ask you since we met earlier—have you ever been to Louisiana?"
"I went to New Orleans when I was younger for Mardi Gras," Chloe confirmed. "Only the once. Why?"
Eric shook his head. "No, that can't be it. I'm not the Mardi Gras kind of vampire, whether we were in or out of the coffin at the time."
"Such a shame," Lucifer said from behind them as they reached the bottom of the staircase. "I've heard the sex parties for Fat Tuesday are to die for."
Chloe gave an insufferable sigh at his comment, but Eric gave a dirty grin. "I prefer my orgies to be more private. I'd be hard pressed to find an appropriate dungeon that could suit my needs in NOLA."
"Oh, you are a naughty Viking. Please, do tell us more." Lucifer jostled to get closer to Eric, pushing Pierce out of his way to reach the front of the group. His hand hit the small of Eric's back and then stayed there, a steady pressure through the leather of Eric's jacket.
"Please, don't," Dan said, deadpan.
Eric was shaking his head, not to be distracted by Lucifer's antics. "You seem familiar to me," he told Chloe. "But I don't think it would have been Mardi Gras." He narrowed his eyes, giving her a once over. He didn't like this woman, not even the least little bit, but he could almost picture her naked perfectly. "Something similar elsewhere?" He brightened for a moment. "Sweden?" It had been a few years since he'd gone home for a visit, and he definitely partook in a few dalliances when he was there last. They couldn't possibly have all been born and bred in his home country.
But Chloe was shaking her head. "Nope, 'fraid not."
"Oh, I know where you've seen her before, Viking," Lucifer said, as he finally caught on.
Another sigh from Chloe, her hand going up to her forehead to massage away a fake headache. Eric was beginning to realize that she was embarrassed by the charismatic man.
"She was in the cinematic gold that was Hot Tub High School. Perhaps you would have watched that?" Lucifer was grinning broadly, delight in his eyes as he clearly thought about the movie.
"Lucifer, must you do this with every single man we meet?" Chloe asked, the exhaustion in her voice apparent.
"Yes, Detective. I must." Lucifer was grinning down at her, but she was too busy scowling and reaching for the door to lead them down the hall.
"Actually, I think he's right," Eric mused, recalling the dreadful years that he ran a video rental place. Decades tied to a bullshit business that the Authority hadn't just handed to him, but demanded him to run. "That one was just on the cusp, I think—it was racy enough for the regular public to want to hide it in their coats when they rented it but not the real deal, so we never put it in the back room."
"The Real Deal?" Chloe asked, and it was clear she wasn't certain if she should be offended or worse.
"Porn, Detective. What else do you think would be in the back room? You had a rental place?" Lucifer's hand, at least, still hadn't left Eric's back as they all crowded down the hall together. "With a bit of an illegal video trade on the side as well?"
"Certainly not by choice. But I had to make an income somehow, didn't I? Fangtasia is in a strip mall because we transformed our dying business as soon as we came out of the coffin. Far more lucrative a business choice, and much less suffering. For the owners, anyway." Eric smiled dryly at that. "The drinks aren't half bad either. Or so I'm told."
"I'm sorry," Dan grumped from behind them. "You have a bar and you call it Fangtasia?"
Eric glanced over his shoulder. "Your point?"
"Naming a place of business using a pun? It's a bit low-brow, don't you think?"
Eric stopped walking completely to face the detective head on. He was starting to understand why Lucifer called this one a douche. "Puns are one of the oldest forms of humour," he informed the obnoxious man. "It requires intellect and wit, being able to make a double entendre that actually works but is also humorous. The highly revered Shakespeare adored them. I know he did; I was there." He popped his fangs and gave Dan an evil grin.
"You expect me to believe that?" Dan asked, and Eric marvelled at the man's complete disregard for his own safety. To continue to chip away at Eric's resolve to be a polite member of society was incredibly brazen—and stupid.
"Tell me, Detective Douche. Are you the type of person to poke a sleeping bear?" Eric's shoulders had tightened again as he squared off with the human with a death wish.
"Don't call me that, vampire," Dan replied, exuding a confidence that the scent of his fear simply did not match.
"Then stop fucking provoking me to attack you," Eric growled. "I barely tolerate insolence from my underlings. I certainly don't take it from pesky humans."
"You're the guest here," Dan replied. "We can kick you out anytime."
"Espinoza, cut it out." This came from Pierce, who had moved on down the hall to stop at the doors that would bring them into the morgue. "The vampire is right. You're trying to get a rise out of him. And for no good reason."
Dan gave his boss an exasperated look. And then he scowled when Lucifer sidled up next to him with a satisfied look on his face. "Can we just get this over with? Why do we even need a vampire here?"
Chloe was next to Pierce, impatient for everyone to get a move on. "I was hoping he could tell us if the dead man was a vampire or not."
Eric's attention was successfully diverted by that comment. A hand raised up and he almost face-palmed, but in the end merely pinched the bridge of his nose like he had a headache. God, humans were stupid, weren't they? They were nothing but a good meal—and not even that great once you got a taste of fairy blood. "You didn't need to bring me here to confirm that," Eric said, dismissing Dan as unworthy of his attention and pacing down the hall. "If there's a body, it's not a vampire."
"How can you be sure of that?" Dan asked from behind him, the shorter detective trying to keep up with Eric's long strides.
"Easy," Eric's reply was swift and emotionless. "There's never a body left when a vampire meets its true death. Either they burn to ash in the sun or they become a congealed and disgusting mess. No in-between. No body to ID. Nothing."
He was greeted by silence, all of the cops seemingly shocked at this revelation. It was Chloe who finally spoke. "How come we don't know anything about that?"
"Because we value our longevity. Anything that can help a human understand our vulnerabilities is considered best to stay a secret. And we have our own Authority policing our kind so we don't go around telling everyone our fucking secrets. Whether it's how to kill us or what our blood does to humans." Eric stopped before the doors and waited for the cops to finally let him into the morgue. "What made you think it could be a vampire?"
Chloe rocked into motion, opening the door and ushering everyone inside. "The body was found wrapped in silver chains. I'd heard somewhere that vampires are allergic to silver. Is that true? Or just a myth to make us feel safe while vampires remain invulnerable?"
"It's true, more or less," Eric replied. "We don't call it an allergy, but it's a good analogy." Eric was the first one through the door to find the coroner working on a dead body halfway across the room. Closer to the door was a second table, currently occupied by a body covered with a sheet. Next to the rolling gurney was a smaller table with what Eric assumed was the dead man's personal effects and, yes, most definitely a large amount of silver chains.
A dead man wrapped in silver? Eric thought that sounded like a warning to other humans. Humans who had silver and weren't afraid to use it. It certainly matched with the bottles of V that Eric had found at the crime scene. He was curious to see what was beneath the sheet—a drug dealer or a fangbanger? Or neither?
Lucifer surged forward, clearly intent on rummaging through the items on the table. "Lucifer," Chloe warned and the man just stopped mere inches from touching a wallet sitting next to the rough pile of silver. Eric made a low growl in his throat at the exchange between the two. He vowed to do precisely what Lucifer wanted to do—just to piss the damn detective off. "Go stand in the corner, Lucifer," Chloe commanded and despite the pout on his face, he did as he was told. Like a child being chastised by a parent.
"She never lets me have any fun, Viking," Lucifer informed Eric, even as he settled against a counter and crossed one leg in front of the other.
The coroner stopped what he was working on and came to greet the detectives.
"What can you tell us?" Chloe asked, trying her best to be in charge among a group of men—some of which probably shouldn't have even been in the room.
"Well, despite the chains, cause of death was definitely bleeding out from a gunshot wound. Some of the chains were put on before the gunshot, but the ones around his neck were placed afterward. Definitely not death by strangulation. Although whoever did it, did do some damage to the flesh. I'd probably place this as a crime of passion due to the fact the perp tried choking him after he was already dead." The coroner looked around at the others, his eyes resting on Eric for a moment. Clearly he was the only newcomer. "He looks human to me, but I've never examined a dead vampire before. Not sure how I could tell the difference."
"You'll never get the chance," Eric said, moving closer to peer at the dead man as the coroner removed the sheet from the body. The body was naked, stitched up in places where the autopsy had been performed. It was apparent that the man had been shot in the gut—not a fun way to go. Long blonde hair, tattoos down one arm, and a perpetual pallor that would follow him to his grave. He could be anyone off the streets of Los Angeles, dead as a doornail under the fluorescent lights. Nothing spectacular about him at all.
Eric tugged at the sheet, pulling it from the coroner's hands so he could look at the entire body. He was looking for fang marks, anything to prove that the man before him had had a symbiotic relationship with a vampire. Proof that he was exchanging blood for blood—it would mean that whoever he was getting the blood from was probably safe, rather than chained up in somebody's basement. But there were no fang marks—not even when he boldly moved a leg to look for bites on the inner thighs.
When Eric looked up from his curious examination, he found almost all eyes on him. "What?" he asked.
"You don't seem too concerned," Dan said. "Almost like this isn't your first corpse." It was an accusation, but Eric had no shame.
"Of course it's not. I'm a thousand years old, detective. You think I've lived this long without seeing death?" Eric moved to look at the collection of belongings neatly laid out.
"Certainly helps that you were probably dealing out the final death blow," Dan shot back.
Eric snorted a dry, sarcastic laugh. "I would say the majority of the corpses I've seen are from far more dangerous threats to humanity than myself."
"Is that so?"
Plain, average clothes. A wallet with a chain. A gun. A handful of knives. A cross on a chain made from genuine silver. And the neat pile of long silver chains—at least a dozen. Perfect for subduing a vampire. Eric looked up, locking eyes with Detective Espinoza. "Do you know how many plagues I've been through, Detective? How many wars I fought, alongside humans? Did you know I witnessed the Crusades? Both World Wars? I promise you, man's worst enemy is certainly not vampires. We're but a nuisance in comparison to man's hatred for his fellow man." He shook his head. "And if you're going to stand there and accuse me of murder simply because I'm a vampire, know that I was killing people long before I was turned. Lucifer isn't calling me Viking for shits and giggles."
Those last words had both Lucifer and Chloe snorting with repressed laughter. Even Pierce had a smirk on his face.
Eric gave an awkward, polite smile. "Now, unless you've got proof that I've killed a specific person, and recently, I suggest you leave off. The best way to Valhalla is in fighting at war, Detective Espinoza. And that's a fact from my human life, not my vampiric one." Eric held his hands up, changing his body language so that he looked innocent and meek. "I've been in line with the laws that have been put in place since we came out of the coffin. I promise everyone, I'm a well-behaved vampire citizen. I drink my Tru Blood like a good boy."
When there was no sarcastic response back, Eric reached for the wallet sitting on the table.
Chloe surged forward, "Don't touch that!" she warned, but Eric was out of her reach in a fraction of a second, wallet in hand. Chloe, Dan and even the coroner were surprised at his speed, but both Lucifer and Pierce seemed unmoved. It was quite obvious who was immortal and who wasn't, if one was paying attention.
Eric stood in the opposite corner from Lucifer and opened the dead man's wallet. He found a surprisingly large wad of cash there, bills ranging from ones to hundreds. There was a variety of credit cards, a couple IDs—one real, one fake no doubt—and surprisingly even a library card. Eric found what he was looking for within the money, though.
Layered between the bills were tiny, ripped up pieces of facial tissue, each one with a tiny drop of dried blood on it. Eric began to pull them out, one by one, letting them flutter to the floor.
"What is that?" Chloe asked, rushing across the room to start sweeping them up into her palm. She looked at one, clearly confused.
"That, Detective, is what you'd call samples." Eric sneered as he continued to drop the damn things on the floor. "It only takes a single drop of blood to get high on V. The older it gets, the more potent it is." Eric held up the last tiny sample, looking at the dark brown mark on it. "I'd say this guy has been pushing V for a while now." He handed the last one to Chloe. It was pointless to try to keep them from her now—she had a handful of them. The vials he'd keep, but the little samples? There wouldn't be enough to test it in a lab, at least.
He closed the wallet and then wandered back to the table to drop it with the rest of the man's things. "I think you're correct that this is a vampire-related crime. I think this man did not have the blessing of the local vampires to be selling our blood, and was stealing vampires in the night. Draining them. Someone finally dealt with him."
"Dealt with him," Pierce echoed. "So what you're saying is this man was murdered by a vampire."
"Dealt with," Eric said again, fingering the gun. "And if I had to guess, he was killed with his own gun."
"And why would you say that?" Chloe asked. She had taken a baggy from her front pocket and was putting the samples of V in it as she walked back across the room. She looked annoyed that he was still touching evidence without gloves on. Eric could care less—this was a vampire crime. Nothing to do with the L.A.P.D.
"A vampire wouldn't be carrying a gun. As Dan has insinuated, vampires are predators. We don't need weapons to subdue a human." Eric pushed the gun toward Chloe. "I don't think the vampire was aiming to kill someone when he met with your victim here. I think the idea was to get him to stop pushing vampire blood and to learn where he was getting the blood from. Except your victim here had been prepared to kidnap the vampire that arrived."
He watched Lucifer's detective open the gun to see that it, indeed, had wooden bullets inside.
"I think this man has been draining vampires—and I also think he's not the only one in Los Angeles. This was a warning."
Pierce came to examine the gun with Chloe, a hand going to the small of her back like some sign to let the others know she was his. Eric frowned at the movement, especially when she leaned into the touch. "Why a warning?" Pierce asked. "Why like this?"
"We police our own," Eric told them. "But we also protect our own. If someone is kidnapping vampires and draining them, our Authority will deal with them rather than let you humans drag us through the judicial system."
"Vigilante justice," Pierce said.
"Yes, the only kind vampires have known for thousands of years," Eric agreed. "Believe it or not, we do have less rights than humans—still."
"What makes you think this guy was draining vampires, as you say?"
"The silver, of course. As your detective said earlier, vampires have a negative reaction to it. It can subdue us, if there is enough." Eric reached a hand out and lay his palm on the pile of silver chains to prove his point.
The sizzling sound of his flesh burning against the gleaming metal was enough to make almost everyone recoil. Tendrils of smoke drifted up from his hand and Eric grimaced at the pain, his fangs coming out involuntarily. All seemed taken aback except Pierce, who leaned closer with interest. Lucifer sprang from his corner to end up at Eric's side in a human heartbeat. Lucifer tugged on Eric's arm, and the vampire willingly let himself be pulled away from the pain. Lucifer flipped his hand over to look at the blistering skin of Eric's palm, frowning. "Don't do that again," he said, finally looking up with concern in his eyes.
"It's fine," he told the other man. "Watch."
Lucifer looked back down to see Eric's palm slowly heal before his eyes.
"It won't kill me," Eric told the devil. "It just hurts like a bitch. And it can be used to restrain a vampire." He grimaced, remembering just a few weeks before. "It can be useful too, if witches are trying to curse you into walking into the sun. Enough silver can restrain even the strongest vampire, even when under a magical compunction." He growled and his eyes slid to Dan. "I unfortunately know from experience."
"Yes, well. I'd just as soon prefer you not hurt yourself if there's no need, Viking," Lucifer said, closing Eric's hand into a fist and holding it loosely within his own.
Chloe cleared her throat, breaking the moment. Lucifer dropped Eric's hand to give his full—undeserved—attention to Chloe. "Right. So how do we go about searching for the vampire who did this?" she asked.
Eric leveled his blue gaze on her. "You don't," he told her.
"Excuse me?" Chloe asked, folder her arms over her chest and giving him a glare.
"You don't find him," Eric said. "And I'm certainly not going to help."
"There's a person out there that's murdered someone else. It doesn't matter to me if it's for selling drugs. A crime has been committed and I've a duty to uphold . . ." Chloe stopped her tirade when Eric rolled his eyes. "Is there a problem?"
"A duty to uphold?" Eric sneered back. "Where were you when this man—and others like him—kidnapped a vampire and drained him or her to the point of death? How many vampires have died at the hands of men like this in your city, while you sit by and do nothing because it's not a murder if the person is already considered legally dead? As far as I'm concerned, no crime has been committed here. He was a problem that you and your police department were doing nothing about."
"So you won't help?" Chloe asked. "Are you threatening to obstruct justice?" She pointedly looked down to where Eric still had the vials of V in his front jeans pocket.
"I'm not obstructing justice," Eric countered. "I'm not from this area and until four o'clock this past morning, I wasn't even here. Besides, are you demanding I put my own safety in jeopardy simply so you can catch a vampire who didn't want to die and put him behind bars where he'll be staked within a week?"
Pierce moved forward and Eric watched as the immortal man put his arm around Chloe's shoulders, drawing her into his side. He could hear Lucifer's tiny sound of distress and it pissed him off even more than Chloe's ignorance to vampire politics. "How do you gather that helping us would threaten your own life?" Pierce asked.
"A vampire helping humans catch another vampire that, by our own governing, has done no wrong?" Eric shook your head. "You don't think my own people would see that as turning on them? Making it worse, this isn't my Area. They would be less inclined to give me the benefit of the doubt when I'm completely out of my jurisdiction, Sheriff or not."
"Sheriff?" Chloe asked, surprised.
Eric gave her a cold smile. "Yes, I'm not your average vampire, I'm afraid. I might be a lowly Sheriff within the hierarchy, but the position gives me power others wouldn't have. It also means there are eyes on me. I've helped you as far as I'm willing."
"Which is a lot, I dare say," Lucifer interjected, trying to make peace between his Detective and his Viking. "He's found you evidence, given you motive, and even explained how vampire society works. We're far ahead of where we were just three hours ago."
Chloe sighed, looking at the body one more time before she pulled the sheet up over his head. "I think we're done here," she finally said.
Chloe thanked the coroner and with Pierce escorting her—with far too much touching—Chloe led the way back out of the morgue.
