Page 51 of The Vampire and the Case of the Perilous Poltergeist

‘Reappropriate?’ I asked.

She winked. ‘That’s law-enforcement speak for steal.’

I looked at the pile of bodies then back to my slender friend. ‘That’s a lot of weight,’ I said dubiously.

‘I’m a mermaid,’ she replied flatly.

I knew what she was but I didn’t know the true extent of her abilities because we’d never talked about stuff like that. Perhaps we should … later. ‘Okay.’

‘What about the guns?’ Her black eyes grabbed the tiniest bit of light from the weak street lamp and flashed.

Connor shrugged. ‘We’ll throw them in with the bodies.’

With George and Harry’s help, we spent the next half hour dragging bodies and guns to the water. Not one soldier was left alive, and I found that hard. Clearly it had been them or us and I understood that choice intellectually, but emotionally I was struggling.

I decided to think about it later, much later when we were safe. Mer-Sidnee, Connor and George seemed perfectly fine with the body count, although Harry was looking a bit green. I was sure that Sidnee would also be green later when she was in her human form again.

We waited inside the warehouse while she did her thing. I sat cross-legged next to Danny with an exhausted Shadow collapsed in my lap, hoping Daniel would wake up soon; by now, he had to have been out for close to four hours.

He came round about thirty minutes later. He was disorientated and I had to explain a couple of times where we were and what was going on. ‘Where are Margi and Eben?’ he asked.

‘We sent them back to the academy. Why?’

Looking grim, Danny shook his head. ‘We need to get to Margi! She isn’t safe.’ He staggered to his feet. ‘The person who stuck me with the damned needle was Eben.’

Fuck.

Chapter 36

‘Eben?’ I repeated. I was in a state of shock. He was one ofus. Why would he harm us? Was he MIB too? The thought made me sick, but some supernatsdidwork with the MIB.

That tickled something at the back of my mind and I thought back. The first time Eben and I had met he’d said he was a witch then he’d later claimed to be a shaman. He’d said he was from the village where Danny had grown up, Nome, but they’d never given the slightest indication that they’d ever met before. I’d put that down to it being a big town; I certainly didn’t know every Portlock resident. But the truth was, Eben may never have set foot in that village. In fact, I couldn’t think of a single occasion when he’d done anything supernat at all. Not ever.

George and Harry also looked shocked. ‘Has Eben ever performed magic around any of you?’ I asked slowly. They shook their heads.

Dammit, he was a plant. Had I inadvertently let anything slip about the attaché case in his presence? I skimmed my memories: no, I hadn’t, thank goodness.

The only thing that stood out about Eben was his secretiveness and quiet judgement, even during supernat classes. We’d accepted him without question, despite his dour demeanour; well, more fool us. The MIB had needed someone within our group because supernats were hard to bring down; they’d needed someone to get up close and personal with us to take us down without killing us. I felt sick. The whole time Eben had been working against us.

How had I not suspected his involvement? Great detective I was turning out to be. The State Trooper Academy was being overrun by the MIB and they were removing supernats and handing them over to a shady black-ops group. They were planning to turn the Alaska State Troopers into a Gestapo group to eliminate supernats. I felt like I’d been dropped behind enemy lines in World War Two – or World War Three, for that matter.

‘We have to get back,’ Danny said urgently. ‘Margi has no one to look out for her.’ Not only was Margi in danger but the papers were at risk every second we delayed. But we couldn’t go yet because Sidnee was still hip-deep in body disposal – literally.

‘We can’t leave Sidnee,’ Connor said before I did.

‘Yeah,’ I added. ‘She’s taking care ofourbusiness and she’s vulnerable if any more MIB show up.’ The MIB had to have a ship somewhere out there and there could be a lot more of them aboard. We were sitting ducks.

Then it hit me: we’d killed MIB, and/or some of the black-ops group. My heart gave a single hard thump. ‘We especially want the vamp,’ ran through my head. We were already on their radar and they’d been planning to kidnap me.

My legs felt weak. If Connor hadn’t reached out and rested his hand in the small of my back, I might have fallen. Hispresence, his love and his steadying hand shored me up, and my legs stopped shaking. This was no time for me to freak out; we needed to find Sidnee and get the hell back to Margi.

The door to the warehouse swung open and we all jumped. Connor leapt in front of me – but it was a wet and naked mermaid. ‘Uh, what’s up?’ she asked curiously, as though we hadn’t sent her out with a bunch of bodies and weaponry to dispose of. Her eyes were soft brown and her teeth normal. My Sidnee was back.

I hurried over and handed over her clothes then stood in front of her to give her a bit of privacy, although it was clear she couldn’t care less. Once she was dressed, she wrung out her hair and quickly braided it.

‘We need to go,’ I said urgently. ‘The short version, Eben is one ofthemand he’s alone with Margi.’

She reeled back. ‘Eben? Quiet Eben? But he’s so sweet.’

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