Page 76 of The Vampire and the Case of the Baleful Banshee

‘You can come and see her now,’ the nurse continued. ‘We’ve got her in a private room in 18C.’

Sidnee looked tiny in the hospital bed and her warm skin was still pale, but she was awake and she smiled at me. Her arm was in a brace and laid across her chest. Her eyes filled with tears. ‘Bunny, you saved me.’ She started to cry.

‘It was very much a group effort,’ I muttered, feeling uncomfortable. All I’d done was rally the troops; Thomas had done most of the heavy lifting, both in tracking and in the actual heavy lifting. He’d carried Sidnee the whole time without complaint – and he was human, too.

Sig wrapped an arm around Sidnee and comforted her until she stopped crying. Gunnar was holding Sidnee’s uninjured hand, stroking it gently. ‘There now. You’re safe, our Sidnee,’ he murmured. I stood back a little and let the family comfort each other because, blood or not, that’s what they were.

After a few moments of quiet whispering, Sigrid turned to me. ‘She wants to talk to you alone, dear. Everyone, scoot.’ She shooed out the men. I noticed that Thomas went without a word; he’d been so obviously concerned for Sidnee, but once she was conscious he’d pasted on a look of casual ease. It was so at odds with his frantic behaviour only hours before. Something to think about another day.

Sig placed another kiss on Sidnee’s forehead then leaned down to murmur, ‘We’ll be in the waiting room.’ She left, shutting the door behind her.

I pulled the chair closer to the bed and took Sidnee’s undamaged hand. ‘It’s going to be all right. It’s over.’

She shook her head; it was a while before she could answer. ‘No, it’s not. He was there, Bunny. Chris was really there.’ She started crying again with the deep sadness of a broken heart. If I ever saw that sea-lion shifter, he’d wish a killer whale had got hold of him instead.

I held her until she pulled herself together enough to talk. ‘What happened? Start at the beginning.’

She looked so tired and broken, but she had to get it out or it would continue to eat her up from the inside. ‘I–I’ve been taking all the hotline calls because they were mostly to me.’

‘What do you mean to you? Weren’t they about fisheye?’

‘Some. But the fisheye tips have really died down.’ She looked at me a while, and then made a decision and it all poured out. ‘I’m only half mer, Bunny.’

‘Yeah, I know. So?’

‘This town can be hard if you aren’t the same as the others.’

‘You’re a siren in the siren group. There are tonnes of different shifters in it.’

‘Yes, but they are pure bred. Remember Chris’s family was upset he was dating a mermaid? Well, they hated it even more because I was only half mermaid.’

I clenched my jaw. People could be so cruel.

‘I’ve been getting hotline calls, people trying to mess with me, calling me a half-breed, or accusing me of being in on the drug dealing with Chris. Then the calls about sightings started. I checked a few and most were people sending me on wild-goose chases. When I showed up, someone would be there to make fun of me.’

‘Fuck that! Why didn’t you tell me?’

She shrugged and winced as the movement jarred her sore arm. ‘I was embarrassed. Besides, I could handle it – this shit has been going on since I moved here. It didn’t help that Gunnar and Sigrid took me in and they weren’t sirens. That made the teasing and bullying worse.’ Her eyes grew fierce. ‘Gunnar and Sig saved me and I’ll always be grateful to them. That’s why I work in the Nomo’s office. It’s my way of giving back.’

‘How old were you?’ I asked. ‘When they took you in, I mean?’

‘Seventeen. They wanted to adopt me, but I’d have been eighteen and an adult by the time the paperwork was done so there was no point.’

‘What happened to your parents?’

She looked away. ‘They were killed in a car accident in the Philippines. They lived in the only supernatural town there. When they died, no one would take me because I was a half-breed. My case was sent out to other towns and the only responders were Gunnar and Sig. They treated me like their own child from the beginning.’

‘So why did you go to the island if you knew people were messing with you?’

‘Because,’ she said reluctantly, ‘one of the last calls was from Chris himself.’

Chapter 48

‘He had the balls to call you?’ I said angrily. ‘What an arsehole!’

‘It was stupid of me but I wanted to see him, to see if he had any feelings for me. Even if I don’t want to be with him anymore – and I don’t,’ she added hastily.

‘What did he say to make you go alone to the island?’

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