Kiss the Dead (Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter #21)

EVERYONE AGREED THAT we'd hit the locations after dawn so the vampires would be dead to the world. We had two dead cops; we didn't need more, so we waited. Waiting is hard. It gets on your nerves. There's a chance to sleep for a few hours, and if you can do it, they'll find you a cot in the back of the station so you can rack out. Almost no one would sleep. We had two of our own dead, and we'd be hunting their killers in a few hours. It either buzzed you or made you think too hard; either way, sleep wasn't happening. Most of us had never known either officer personally, but it didn't matter. If you'd thought one of them was the biggest dick in the world while he was alive, that didn't matter either. What mattered was that he carried a badge and so did you. That meant that if you'd put out a call for help, he'd have come, and he would have put his life on the line for you. Stranger, friend, it didn't matter; you would have risked your life for him, and he for you, and if you had to, you'd have walked into a firefight with him, because that was what it meant to carry the badge. It meant that when everyone else was running away, you ran toward the problem, and anyone else who was willing to run into the shitstorm with you was your brother in arms. Civilians think that cops react like this because they're thinking, There but for the grace of God go I, but that's not it, not the major part; we're human, so there is some of that, but mostly it's an acknowledgment that we are the ones who run toward the gunshots. We run toward the trouble, not away, and we trust that if another person with a badge is nearby, they'll start running in that direction, too. They'll be beside us, and we'll hit the big, bad thing together, because that's our job; it's who we are.

The vampires hadn't just killed two cops, they'd killed two men who would have put their shoulders beside ours and hit the door. They'd taken out two of the good guys, and that wasn't allowed. Part of the energy, as we waited, was that we weren't just going to track the bad guys down; we were going to kill them, and it was all nice and legal. We'd hunt them down and we'd execute them. Technically, it was serving a warrant of execution, because now we had an official warrant, but to me it was just a vampire hunt with SWAT backup.

There were three locations, so I was the Marshal at one; Larry would be the Marshal at the second location, and our newest member of the Preternatural Branch, U.S. Marshal Arlen Brice, would go in with the third team. Brice was one of the new breed of preternatural Marshals, one who had been a regular police officer for at least two years and then trained for preternatural work in classrooms, not in the field. I had yet to meet a Marshal who had been trained this way who came from any branch of law enforcement that gave them the skill set they needed for hunting vampires and rogue wereanimals, because badge or no badge, preternatural Marshals are legalized assassins. We kill people in order to save lives, but our main job is killing. Police save lives, and most go their whole twenty without ever drawing their gun in the line of duty. Most Marshals in the Preternatural Branch kill at least one vampire their first month in the field, sometimes more. Anyone who thinks that killing vampires isn't like killing real people should try it for a while and see how it feels. I've killed human beings in the line of duty, and honestly, other than the fact that they're easier to kill, it just doesn't feel that different.

But U.S. Marshal Arlen Brice didn't know that yet.

Brice was five-eight, five-nine, short, but with nicely cut hair in one of those in-between colors that was either pale brown or a really dark blond. When I'd been a little girl I would have called it pale brown, but a girl in my class had hair almost the same color and she had informed me that it was "champagne blond." My stepmother had confirmed it was an actual color, but most people called it "dirty blond." That childhood faux pas had left its mark, so Brice's hair color was a mystery until he told me otherwise. His eyes were a pale, almost amber brown, so even the eyes weren't quite brown enough to call.

The rest of him was standard handsome, with an easy smile that went up a little higher on one side and just seemed to add to his charm, because he was charming. Detective Jessica Arnet and any other female officer who came near him reacted to him in a way that let me know that a more ordinary flavor of handsome worked just fine for them. Arnet had finally gotten over her crush on Nathaniel, my live-in sweetie. She still didn't like me. She felt that my keeping it secret that Nathaniel was my live-in lover had somehow humiliated her when she made a play for him. No pleasing some people.

Zerbrowski and I threaded our way through all the extra people who were hanging around the headquarters for the Regional Preternatural Investigation Team, RPIT for short. We weren't going to sleep so we decided to catch food at a restaurant we both liked. The first hint I had that Marshal Brice was behind us was Detective Arnet's voice, high and lilting: "Hey, Brice, do you want to get a bite to eat?"

"I really appreciate the offer, Detective, but I already said I'd catch food with Detective Zerbrowski and Marshal Blake."

That stopped me and Zerbrowski in our tracks. We looked at each other, and I knew from the look on his face that this was news to him, too. We turned to look at him, giving blank cop face, both of us waiting for Brice to catch up as if we'd meant to do it all along.

Larry was the next to offer food, but Brice just smiled and said, "Thanks, Marshal Kirkland, I'll catch you next time."

Larry actually touched the man's arm and said, "What kind of Marshal do you want to be, Brice?"

The question stopped Brice, made him look more fully at Larry, and then glance back at Zerbrowski and me. Brice smiled at Larry. "One who's good at his job, Marshal Kirkland." He kept smiling, but his eyes changed. The look wasn't directed at us, so from the side it was harder to read, but whatever was in those brown-gold eyes made Larry drop his hand.

"I'm good at my job," Larry said. His words were soft, but they carried in one of those weird moments of silence that happens in noisy rooms with crowds. Everyone goes quiet at the same time and suddenly everyone can hear.

"I never said otherwise," Brice said, but he walked away from Larry.

Larry actually blushed, but it wasn't embarrassment. It was anger. "I'm a good Marshal."

Brice's face was serious, almost sad, but I think only we saw it. He got his smile back in place as he turned around to Larry and the still-silent room. "I'll repeat myself, Marshal Kirkland; I never said otherwise."

"Don't let her make you into a killer."

And just like that our little family feud, Larry's and mine, was suddenly very public. The silence was so thick you could have spread it on bread, but you wouldn't have wanted to eat it. Everyone was straining to hear now, because everyone likes gossip, even cops.

Brice said, "Last I checked, Kirkland, our job description says we execute the monsters. That makes us killers, legal and all, but we're supposed to kill things, Marshal Kirkland; it's our job."

"I know my job," Larry said, voice tight.

Brice smiled a little more, and ran his hand through his well-cut hair; it was an aw-shucks movement. It made him look harmless and charming. I wondered if it was on purpose, or just a habit.

"Well now, I can't speak to that yet, but I know that Blake still has the highest kill count of any Marshal in the service. I know that every officer I've spoken to would take her as backup in a firefight. Even the ones who hate her personal life with a vengeance would still take her into a shoot-out and trust her to keep them alive. If there's higher praise from one officer to another, I don't know it."

If Larry followed both the guy and cop rules, he would let it go, but part of the problem was that he didn't follow those unspoken rules. "Are you saying that people don't trust me to keep them safe?"

"I'm just trying to go get some food with two fellow officers; anything else is what you're thinking, not what I'm saying. I just complimented Marshal Blake. I didn't say a damn thing about you." Brice was still smiling a little, still all aw-shucks-ma'am in his demeanor, but there was something harder now, some hint of steel underneath that handsome nice-guy exterior.

Zerbrowski said, "Come on, Brice, I'm starving."

He turned and looked at Zerbrowski, and there was a smile again, but his eyes held more. He wanted out of this conversation with Larry, but if he couldn't get out of it, he'd finish it. That one look and I knew that Larry should shut the fuck up, before he made it impossible for him and Brice to ever be friends. They wouldn't be enemies, but if Larry forced it, they'd never be more than coworkers - hostile coworkers.

Brice started walking toward us, and Larry let him go, but he gave me the hard look, not the man's back as he walked away. Why was everything always my fault?

Brice caught up to us and moved past us, saying quietly, "Let's go before Kirkland says something I'm going to regret." And just like that, Brice was with Zerbrowski and me.