Page 93 of Burn Falls

“Father’s. Your favorite whiskey is her recipe.”

“No shit?” Athan said out loud.

“Is he your sire too?” Calla asked Athan.

“Yeah.”

“How did you two get away from him?”

“Drove,” I stated, but then elaborated when Calla’s eyebrows scrunched. “You’ve heard of Capone?”

“Yeah, who hasn’t?”

I told Calla about the night I was supposed to kill Malone and how I wasn’t able to do it. She took the picture from me and looked at the back.

“So maybe they were friends?”

“What does your mom know?” Athan asked.

“Just that her name was Gael and she’s my grandma’s mother. I never met her. She died when my dad was a teenager.”

“And she died human?” he probed.

“I mean …” Calla hesitated. “As far as I know.”

“Is your grandmother still alive?” Athan inquired.

“Yes, actually, but she’s in her nineties.”

“Does she look ninety?” I figured she would, or there would be a lot of people, including her family, asking questions.

“Yes.”

“And she lives in Ireland?” I queried some more.

“Yes.”

“Does she go out during the day?” Athan asked.

Calla thought for a moment. “Yes, but hold on.” We watched as she rummaged through the top drawer of her desk. “I was putting my dad’s old pictures in frames and wanted to decorate his—I meanmyoffice with them. But I only had the one, so I decided to put Gael’s picture in it since it’s her recipe. Here are a few others of our family. This one is of Gael and her husband and kids. As you can see, they are all outside.”

I took the photo and looked at the back, seeing that it was dated July 2, 1951.

“And this one is of my grandma and grandpa on what I assumed was their wedding day.”

Athan looked over my shoulder as I took the picture from Calla. It was dated October 4, 1967, and they were both dressed in wedding attire. They were also outside in front of a car, proving that she wasn’t a vampire.

“To recap,” I started so we were all on the same page, and I was clear as fuck, “the picture with Renzo is dated 1946 and is of your great-grandmother. The picture of your grandma (your great-grandmother’s daughter) is dated 1951 and of her as a kid with your great-grandmother and another man, plus other children. The one dated 1967 is of your grandma and grandpa on their wedding day. And all the ones after Renzo’s are outside and prove they weren’t vampires.”

“I think so unless you know of a way that vampires can have children and go outside in the sun,” Calla said, taking the pictures back from me.

I looked at Athan, and he said, “I don’t. I’ve never known a vamp to have kids or not get burned in the sun.”

I nodded because I didn’t know of any other way besides them being human either. “Okay, so Renzo and Gael only knew each other then and didn’t have a kid together. Still one hell of a coincidence.”

“Yeah,” Calla sighed. “It sure is.”

We’d left the distillery and went to dinner at Bartoli’s. Athan left to go back to do whatever he was doing when I’d called him, and he said he wasn’t coming back to my place until it was almost time for the sun to rise. That, of course, meant he was giving us alone time—in my own house.