Page 9 of Smokescreen (Knight & Daywalker #1)

D etective Cain and I reached the dining room just in time to see the butler snap. Jennings, I was pretty sure his name was.

He was a staid, older British guy, and as one might expect, he’d always been the sort of person who didn’t display his emotions.

As we walked under the great gilded archway into the dining room, though, he looked at the maid, who was somehow still sobbing, still incredibly loud, and said, “For god’s sake, woman, control yourself.

You’ve been working here a week, you’ll be fine. ”

It wasn’t quiet—couldn’t be, since he was sitting near the opposite end of the very long dining room table from her.

Then, for a moment, he looked...as though he was in literal, physical pain.

I imagined that was because he, unlike the maid, had been working for Charles most of his life.

What other job could he find, anywhere, at his age?

Let alone another job with someone he knew as well as Charles.

Working for the same guy for like, fifty or sixty years wasn’t the kind of thing you just moved on from.

It wasn’t like he was a vampire, who was in the same health he’d been in before, and would have another century or five to keep going.

“I’m sure Charles’s will is going to provide for the staff who’s been with him the longest,” I offered, even though we both knew damned well that Charles probably didn’t have a will.

Why would a vampire ever have a thing like that?

Jennings, though, looked at me like I was the sun rising in his window after the world’s longest night, turning bright, hopeful eyes on me. “Do you think so, Mr. Knight?”

“I’m sure,” I confirmed. Because yeah, I was almost certain that Charles hadn’t had a will, because no vampire expects to die, but I also knew that the vampiric community always circled the wagons in situations like this one, and that circle included people like Jennings, who was as much “one of us” as I was.

“I’ll talk to Mom, I’m sure she knew who his lawyer was.

You and the household staff who’ve been with him for years would never be expected to just walk away with nothing. ”

For some reason, this made the sobbing woman sob even harder. Maybe because she hadn’t been with Charles for fifty years, and couldn’t expect a big windfall.

Frankly, I didn’t know how she had the lungs for it.

I hadn’t ever cried much, but I remembered it being.

..kind of hard? Like, prolonged sobbing led to silent sobbing because you just didn’t have the strength to keep it up that long.

Maybe this woman had been an opera singer in a previous life, though, because her lungs were not struggling at all.

I looked her over, in case the dramatics were designed to make people look away, but I was quite sure I didn’t know her from anywhere.

Also, she was sobbing something about “all that blood,” which seemed like a valid reason to freak out to me.

It had sure as hell turned my stomach, and I’d walked in knowing something terrible had happened.

Poor thing was probably going to need years of therapy after discovering her brand-new employer with half his face crushed.

“I told them I couldn’t possibly know what Mr. Mailloux’s list was for,” Jennings said aloud from his seat at one corner of the dining room table, his tone reassuring, and he met my eye and held it, like he was trying to impart important information.

Or more likely, like he was trying to assure me he hadn’t ratted my mother out for anything, just in case.

Then he glanced at the maid, more than a little disdain in his tone, and went on.

“I doubt she would even know who any of the names were.”

We both looked at her, and she glanced up in time to see the expressions on our faces, her lips trembling.

“Don’t look at me. I didn’t know any of his friends.

They were terrible, coming and going at all hours of the night, instead of in the daytime like respectable people. You’d think he was a drug kingpin.”

At that comment, the fifth person in the room perked up. “Did you see any evidence of drugs?”

“Of course she did not,” Jennings insisted, glaring at first the maid, then the detective.

The guy was definitely another detective, but I didn’t remember him from my previous experience when I’d found the body.

He was a shortish, sallow, paunchy middle-aged guy in an ill-fitting bright blue suit that was way too flashy for a guy who looked like that.

Off-the-rack special, I thought, given how it was too big in the shoulders and too tight at the waist, and that ugly shade of blue that was so popular with a certain tasteless crowd.

Weirdly, I suspected he was close to Cain’s age, but. ..the same appeal just wasn’t there.

On the other hand, the detectives weren’t there for me to decide whether they were attractive, but to investigate a murder.

Since worrying about what time of day Charles conducted his business was both a waste of their time and a danger to the vampiric community, I ignored the maid’s assertions about it.

Instead, I walked over to the dining table and pulled out the chair at the end, sitting catty-corner from Jennings. Twist poked her head out of my pocket to look around, and true to type, Jennings didn’t even blink at the living creature popping up from nowhere.

“Let’s see this list, then,” I said to Cain. “Maybe I can help give you some information about the people on it.”

The other detective narrowed his eyes at me, and Cain sighed in annoyance, marching over and snatching something off the table in front of him, then heading back to me. I lifted an eyebrow when he got to me. “New partner?”

His scowl could have peeled paint. “No. Detective Miller here is from vice, and he’s just been reassigned until his partner is back from an injury. Jill did retire, though, so since I don’t have a partner right now, they gave him to me.”

I recalled Cain’s previous partner, an older blonde woman with a no-nonsense ponytail, perfectly tailored severe suits, and deep crimson lipstick. She’d always seemed a lot like my mother: terrifyingly efficient. “I’m sorry to hear she retired,” I offered. “She seemed good at her job.”

“She was the best,” Cain agreed, looking miserable about it. Poor guy. He set down a clear plastic bag in front of me, inside which was a single piece of paper. “This is the list that was on his desk. Know any of the other people on it?”

The list, as it turned out, didn’t just have my mother at the top. She was the subject. It was a sheet of lined paper, and her name was at the very top above the lines, underlined with a pen. Below it was a list of names that was instantly concerning.

Gerald Forsyth. Wu Mei. Carmen Aguilar. I didn’t have to read past those few names at the top to know it was a list of the vampires in Los Angeles who had the biggest issues with my mother.

Two had also wanted the senate job Mother had, and Mr. Forsyth, while a more recent arrival than the election, did not approve of how strict Mother was about following human laws.

He thought vampires were better than humans, and shouldn’t be “pigeonholed” into human rules.

“You know them,” Cain observed, apparently just from my facial expressions.

“What did you mean, does he know other people?” Miller demanded of him a second later.

Cain waved him off, but he did answer as he pulled out the chair across from Jennings and sat down next to me. “His mother’s name is on the list.”

Miller made a horrified sound, and power-walked toward us, hand reaching out like he was going to snatch the bag from in front of me.

I committed the rest of the names to memory, then leaned away from it without touching it, pressing myself into the stiff-backed dining chair and affecting a casual pose.

“I’m gonna be honest, Detective Cain,” I told him, keeping an eye on him instead of Miller, who did indeed grab the bag with the list away from the table in front of me and then smoothed it down, acting like I’d made any effort to keep him from it, or damage the list in any way.

I ignored the dramatic jerk and went on.

“If Charles was planning the worst birthday surprise party ever for my mother, that would have been the guest list.”

Miller turned and stared at me, beady eyes squinting, perplexed.

Cain looked . . . well hell, he looked amused. “How’s that?”

“Basically, all of those people feel about my mother the same way Charles did, or worse. Last month at an art gallery opening, Mother told Ms. Aguilar her dress was ‘an unfortunate choice’ because ‘red makes you look so sallow, dear,’ and...well, basically all of them are like that. They’re a bunch of rich assholes who all run in the same circles, and offhand, it looks like Charles was looking for other people who also think my mother is kind of a bitch. ”

Miller scowled at me, taking a step back and pressing the note to his chest protectively. Cain lifted his hand to cover his mouth, clearly trying to hide amusement. Jennings, next to me, made a tiny choking noise. Across the room, the maid continued to sob, loud as ever.

I turned to Jennings, lifting a brow. “To be fair, Ms. Aguilar really does look terrible in red.”

Jennings reverted to type, bowing his head and shoulders in my direction. “Madame would almost certainly be more suited to a cooler shade. Navy, perhaps, or peacock.”

I turned back and shrugged. “It’s a social circle.

I couldn’t say if he was finished writing his list, because there are probably a dozen other people in LA in the same situation as that lot.

They were all at the gallery opening in question.

Also”—I turned to Jennings—“Mother mentioned Rigoletto when I saw her for dinner last night?”

“Opened last Saturday evening, sir.” Jennings answered with a nod. “Your mother and sir were most certainly both in attendance.”