Morganville Vampires 06 - Carpe Corpus Part 15

Hannah nodded. "That's why we're doing it fast, girlfriend. So let's move."

Mom and Dad were having an argument; Claire could hear it from where she and Hannah stood on the front porch of their house, ringing the doorbell. Claire felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach. Her parents didn't fight very often, but when they did, it was usually over something important.

The shouty blur of voices broke off, and about ten seconds later, the door whipped open. Claire's mom stood there, color burning high in her cheeks. She looked stricken when she caught sight of Claire, very obviously a guilty-looking earwitness to the fighting, but she rallied and gave a bright smile and gestured them both inside.

"Sheriff Hannah Moses, ma'am," Hannah said without waiting for introductions. "I don't think we've met in person before. I've known your daughter for a while now. She's good people."

She offered her hand, and Claire's mother took it for a quick shake as her eyes darted anxiously from Claire to Hannah, then back.

"Is there some kind of problem, Sheriff Moses?"

"Hannah, please." Hannah really was turning on the charm, and she had an awful lot of it. "May I talk with you and your husband at the same time? This concerns both of you."

With only a single, worried look over her shoulder, her mother led the way down the long hallway and into the living room area.

Same floor plan as the Gla.s.s House, but so wrenchingly different, especially now. Claire got mental whiplash from expecting to see the familiar battered couch and Michael's guitar and the cheerful stacks of books against the wall; instead, her mother's ruthlessly efficient housekeeping had made this room magazine-feature-ready, everything carefully aligned and straightened.

The only thing that wasn't ready for the photo shoot was Claire's father, who sat in one of the leather armchairs, face flushed. He had a stubborn set to his jaw, and an angry fire in his eyes that Claire hadn't seen in, well, forever. Still, he got to his feet and shook hands with Hannah, politely gesturing her to the couch while Claire's mom sank down on the other end, with Claire left to take the middle seat. Normally, her mom would have been fluttering around offering coffee and cookies and sandwiches, but not this time.

She just took the other armchair and looked worried.

Hannah said, "Let's put all our cards on the table. There's a town emergency. Mr. and Mrs. Danvers, you are going to need to come with us. Pack a bag for a few nights, take whatever you need that you can't live without. I can give you about fifteen minutes."

That was . . . blunt. Claire blinked. She expected a flood of questions from her parents, but she was surprised by the silence.

Claire's parents looked at each other, and then her father nodded. "Good," he said. "I've wanted to do this for a while. Claire, go with your mother and pack. I'll be up in a second."

"Um . . ." Claire cleared her throat and tried not to look as awkward as she felt. "I'm not going, Dad."

They both looked at her as if she'd spoken in Chinese. "Of course you are," her mom said. "You're not staying here alone. Not with what we know about how dangerous it is."

"I'm sorry, but you know just enough about Morganville to get yourselves in trouble," Hannah said. "This really isn't up for discussion. You have to pack, and you have to go. And Claire can't come with you, at least not yet."

One thing about Hannah: when she said something like that, she clearly meant it. In the silence that fell, Claire felt the weight of both her parents' stares directly on her, so she looked down at her clasped hands instead. "I can't," she said. "It's complicated."

"No, it's not," her dad said, with a steely undertone in his voice she couldn't remember hearing before. "It's absolutely simple. I'm your father, you're under eighteen, and you're coming with us. I'm sorry, Chief Moses, but she's too young to be here on her own."

"Dad, you sent me here on my own!" Claire said.

"Why do you think we were fighting, Claire?" her mom replied. "Your father was just reminding me that I was the one who thought sending you to a school close by, just to get some experience with it, would be a good idea. He wanted you to go straight to MIT, although how we were going to pay for that, I really don't have any-"

Dad interrupted her. "We're not going to start this up again. Claire, we were wrong to let you go off on your own here in the first place, no matter how safe we thought it would be. And we're fixing that now. You're coming with us, and things will be better once we're out of this town."

Claire's hands formed into fists as frustration boiled up inside her. "Are you listening to me? It's too late for all that stuff! I can't go with you!"

She should have guessed that they'd make the wrong a.s.sumptions . . . and, in a way, the right one. "It's the boy, isn't it?" Claire's mother said. "Shane?"

"What? No!" Claire blurted out a denial that, even to her own ears, sounded lame and guilty. "No, not really. It's something else.

Like I said, it's complicated."

"Oh my G.o.d . . . Claire, are you pregnant?"

"Mom!" She knew she looked as mortified as she felt, especially with Hannah looking on.

"Honey, has that boy taken advantage of you?" Her father was charging full speed down the wrong path; he even stood up to make it more dramatic. "Well?"

Claire stared at him, openmouthed, unable to even try to speak. She knew she should lie, but she just couldn't find the words.

In the ringing silence, her father said, "I want him arrested."

Hannah asked, "On what charge, sir?"

"Are you kidding? He had s.e.x with my underage daughter!" He gave Claire a look that was partly angry, partly wounded, and all over dangerous. "Go ahead, tell me I'm wrong, Claire."

"It . . . wasn't like that!" Her dad transferred his glare over to Hannah. "You see? I'll swear out a complaint if I need to."

Hannah looked perfectly comfortable. "Sir, there's no complaint to be sworn out here. Fact is, Claire is seventeen years old, which by Texas law makes her able to give consent on her own. Shane's only a year older than she is. There's no laws being broken here, beyond maybe the law of good sense, which I think you'll admit is often a casualty of our teen years. This is a family matter, not a matter for the police."

Her father looked shocked, then even angrier. "That's insane! It has to be illegal!"

"Well, it's not, sir, and it has nothing to do with why I'm telling you Claire needs to stay in Morganville. That has to do with the vampires." Hannah had deftly moved the whole thing off the subject of Shane and s.e.x, for which Claire was spine-meltingly grateful. "I'm telling you this for your own good, and for Claire's own good: she stays here. She won't be unprotected; I promise you that. We're committed to keeping her safe."

"Who's we?" Claire's dad wasn't giving up without a fight.

"Everybody who counts," Hannah said, and raised her eyebrows. "Time's a-wastin', Mr. Danvers. We really can't debate this.

You need to go right now. Please go pack."

In the end, they did. Claire went to help her mother, reluctantly; she didn't want the subject to come back to her and Shane, but it did as soon as the door was closed. At least her father wasn't in the room. G.o.d, that had been awkward.

"Honey." Claire paused in the act of dragging a suitcase out from under her parents' bed, took one look at the serious expression on her mother's face, and kept on with what she was doing. "Honey, I really don't like your getting involved with that boy-that man. And it's not appropriate for you to be living in that house with him. I just can't allow that."

"Mom, could we please focus on not getting killed today? I promise, you can give me the I'm-so-disappointed-in-you speech tomorrow, and every day after, if you will just pack!"

Her mother opened a drawer of the dresser by the window, grabbed a few handfuls of things at random, and threw them into the open suitcase. Not normal. Mom made those people who worked retail clothing stores look sloppy about how they folded things.

She moved on to the next drawer, then the next. Claire struggled to neaten up the mess.

"Just tell me this," her mother said as she dumped an armload of clothes from the closet onto the bed. "Are you being safe?"

Oh lord, Claire did not want to have the birds-and-bees part two conversation with her mother. Not now. Not ever, to be honest; they'd suffered through it once, awkwardly, and once was enough. "Yes," she said, with as calm and decisive a tone as she could manage. "He insisted." She meant that to reflect well on Shane. Of course, Mom took it the wrong way.

"You mean you didn't? Oh, Claire. It's your body!"

"Mom, of course I-" Claire took a deep breath. "Can we just pack? Please?"

She winced as a rain of shoes descended on the bed.

Hannah was waiting when she finally dragged the suitcase downstairs. Claire's father had come in for a few minutes, just long enough to add his few things to the pile, and then he'd tried to tote the bag himself, but Claire had insisted on doing it. The thing was fifty pounds, at least.

Hannah raised her eyebrows at Claire. What happened?

Claire rolled her eyes. Don't ask.

It was a cold, silent ride to the bus.

Richard Morrell had commandeered two genuine Grey-hound buses, with plush seats and tinted windows. According to the hand- lettered sign in the front window, it was a charter heading to Midland/Odessa, but Claire suspected they'd go somewhere else as a destination.

The first bus was already being loaded by the time Claire arrived with her parents; in line to board were most of the town officials and Founder House residents, including the Morrells. Eve was there, too, holding a clipboard and checking people in at a folding table.

"Oh, look, there's your friend," Claire's mom said, and pointed. "She doesn't look very happy."

She wasn't pointing at Eve, but at Monica. Monica definitely wasn't happy. She had to be forced onto the bus, arguing the entire time with her brother, who looked hara.s.sed and angry. She'd somehow managed to shoe-horn her two friends into the evacuation along with her, although Gina and Jennifer looked a lot more relieved at being given a chance to leave town. Monica was probably thinking that she stood a better chance of social queen bee-ness with Bishop than if Amelie was in charge, but she was thinking short-term; if what Myrnin said was right, and Claire had no reason to think it wasn't, then the entire social order of Morganville was about to get shattered, and being the most popular wouldn't get you anything but more face time with the firing squad.

The argument with Monica came from the fact that Richard Morrell refused to get on the bus. Well, Claire had seen that coming.

He wasn't the type to run. "There's a whole town here that can't get out," he snapped at his sister, who was stubbornly resisting getting pushed toward the idling bus. "People who need looking after. I'm the mayor. I have to stay. Besides, since Dad's gone, I'm on the town council. I can't just go."

"You have got such an ego, Richard! n.o.body's counting on you. Most of the stupid people in this town would claw one another apart to get out, if they thought they could." "That's why I'm staying," he said. "Because those people need order. But I need for you to go, Monica. Please. You need to look after our mom."

Monica wavered. Claire, looking up, could see Mrs. Morrell sitting on the bus, looking out the window with a distant, remote expression. Monica had said her mother wasn't dealing very well, and she did look thin and frail and not entirely in this world.

"That is such emotional blackmail!" Monica spat. Behind her, Gina and Jennifer looked at each other, took a few quiet steps back, and mounted the stairs to board the bus, leaving Monica on her own. "Seriously, Richard. I can't believe you're sending me away like this!"

"Believe it. You're getting on, and getting out of here. Now. I need you to be safe." He hugged her, but she stiff-armed him with an angry glare, and turned and boarded without another word. She slumped into the seat behind Jennifer and Gina, next to her mother, and folded her arms in silent protest.

Richard breathed a sigh of relief, then turned to Claire's parents. "Please," he said. "We need to get these buses moving."

Claire's father shook his head.

"Dad," Claire said, and tugged on his arm. "Dad, come on."

He still hesitated, staring at Hannah, then Richard, then Claire. Still shaking his head in mute refusal.

"Dad, you have to go! Now!" Claire practically shouted. She felt sick inside, worried for them and relieved to think they'd be safe, finally, somewhere outside of Morganville. Somewhere none of this could touch them. "Mom, please. Just make him go! I don't want you here; you're just in the way!"

She said it in desperation, and she saw it hurt her parents a little. She'd said worse to them over the years; she'd had her share of I hate you and I wish you were dead, but that had been when she was just a kid and thought she knew everything.

Now, she knew she didn't, but in this case, she knew more than they did.

Frustrating, because they'd never see it that way.

"Don't you talk to us like that, Claire!" her mother snapped. Her dad put a hand on her shoulder and patted, and she took a deep breath.

"All right," Dad said, "I can see you're not going to come without a fight, and I can see your friends here aren't going to help us."

He paused, and Claire swallowed hard at the look in his eyes as he locked stares with Hannah, then Richard. "If anything happens to our daughter-"

"Sir," Richard said. "If you don't get on the bus, something is going to happen to all of us, and it's going to be very, very bad.

Please. Just go."

"You need to do it for your daughter," Hannah added. "I think you both know that, deep down. So you let me worry about taking care of Claire. You two get on the bus. I promise you, this will be over soon."

It was a sad sort of farewell, full of tears (from Mom and Claire) and the kind of too-strong hug that meant Claire's father felt just as choked up, but wasn't willing to show it. Her mother smoothed her hair, just like she'd done since Claire was a little girl, and kissed her gently on the cheek.

"You be good," she said, and looked deep into Claire's eyes. "We're going to talk about things later."

She meant about Shane, of course. Claire sighed and nodded, and hugged her one last time. She watched them walk up the stairs and onto the bus.

Her parents took a seat near the front, with her mom next to the window. Claire gave a sad little wave, and her mom waved back.

Mom was still crying. Dad looked off into the distance, jaw set tight, and didn't wave back.

The bus closed its doors with a final hiss and pulled away from the deserted warehouse that served as a dropoff point for the departures. Three police cars fell in behind it, driven by people Hannah had handpicked.

Claire shivered, even though she was standing in the sun. They're leaving. They're really leaving. She felt very alone.

The bus looked so vulnerable.

"Cold?" A jacket settled around her shoulders. It smelled like Shane. "What did I miss?"

She turned, and there he was, wearing an old gray T-shirt and jeans. His leather jacket felt like a hug around her body, but it wasn't enough; she dived into the warmth of his arms, and they clung together for a moment. He kissed the top of her head. "It's okay," he said. "They'll be okay."

"No, it's not okay," she said, m.u.f.fled against his chest. "It's just not."

He didn't argue. After a moment, she turned her head, and together they watched the caravan stream away toward the Morganville city limits.

"Why is it," she asked in a plaintive little voice, "that I can fight vampires and risk death and they can accept that, but they can't accept that I'm a woman, with my own life?"

Shane thought about that for a second; she could see him trying to work it out through the framework of his own admittedly weird childhood. "Must be a girl thing?"

"Yeah, must be."

"So I'm guessing you told them."

"Um . . . not on purpose. I didn't expect them to be so . . . angry about it." "You're their little girl," Shane said. "You know, when I think about it, I'd feel the same way about my own daughter."

"You would?" There was something deliciously warm about the fact that he wasn't afraid to say that to her. "So," she said, with an effort at being casual that was probably all too obvious. "You want to have a daughter, then?"

He kissed the top of her head. "Hit the brakes, girl."

But he didn't sound angry about it, or nervous. Just-as was usual with Shane-focused on what was in front of them right now. A sense of calm was slowly spreading through her, sinking deeper with every breath. It felt better when she was with him. Everything felt better.

Shane asked, "What about the Goldmans? Were they on the bus, too?"

"I didn't see the Goldmans," Claire said. "Hannah?"