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I was living in a for to police records, vamps hadn&039;t been totally in the closet in certain cities across the globe, even before the fa of Marilyn Monroe by the Secret Service in the Oval Office while she was trying to turn President Kennedy That event had revealed the existence of vampires, and shortly thereafter, witches, to the public, but prior to that, vamps had an undeniable - if shadowed and veiled - presence in such cities as Paris, London, Mumbai, Tokyo, and New Orleans In and around the French Quarter they had attained a clandestine notoriety in the early nineteen hundreds living in Storyville, the section of the city once set aside for houses of ill repute, saloons, ga houses, honky-tonks,to the baser side of hued at least three houses of prostitution in the district set aside by Sidney Story from 1897 to 1917, houses licensed and operated within the law

According to the Blue Book, which listed the names, descriptions, and addresses of more than seven hundred prostitutes, the vamp houses had been dedicated to "lusty lasses, a bit of blood, and the nick of a delicate whip," as well as "the finest professors in the land," professors being the musicians who played in the houses The names of the three vamp houses were kind of corny: Countess Sire, and Katie&039;s Ladies That last one I kneell

I looked up to see the e devices, saw that it was clean, and blew out a relieved breath I hadn&039;t realized how tense I was until I let ht be provocative, but I was a hen it came to cops I blew out another breath and forced raphs of the bawdy houses, pausing at Katie&039;s In front of the house a blond woht pole, back arched, her skirts and petticoats tossed high to reveal long, slender legs, garters and stockings, and low boots

Her dress was open, displaying a lot of cleavage It was Katie, her fangs displayed as carnally as her body

The house she stood in front of was French with lots of black wrought iron in a fleur-delis pattern, and had a second-story balcony over the front Gaslights burned in the early evening, reflecting onglass The narrow door had a leaded glassin the upper half, and was very familiar to me The house in the photo here I currently lived Great I was living in a former whorehouse

But a vamp on film? I hadn&039;t known it was possible, yet, as I thuraphs, bodies and fangs on exhibition, each one signed by the well-known Storyville photographer Ernest J Bellocq Bellocq had raph a number of famous vamps of the time, despite the inability of vauerreotypes and the later wet collodion-process photographs I wondered how he had done it Most people thought vaital cameras had appeared And yet, here was the proof that soht have answered my questions about vamp history, but she was unavailable, sent to earth to heal the wounds that would have led to her final death My first few days in New Orleans had resulted in pretty es in some of my employers&039; lives

I stopped at one erotic photo of two va on a bar, bottles of liquor lining the wall behind her, her head thrown back in what looked like pure carnal ecstasy Her breasts were exposed, her skirts hitched around her waist Her bare legs were spread Aher with his mouth

The man looked like a fashion plate, even involved in the inti a short-waist coat, trendy in the day, slim pants and boots, and a top hat The top hat was still in place, as was the long black hair he wore coe heat pulsed throughwhen Leo healed ery, maimed, and in serious rehab That had been erotic too, and he had only been licking my arm Chill bumps rose on the back of my neck

I shook my head and pushed away the memory and the sensations that warmed my skin

I removed the camera froital caht not needall of these for ator can never know too much backstory

I drew another file from the history folder This one was markedVa to the laho had done the paperwork for ue hunters, which made my livelihood dependent on it A notation on the front cover indicated the papers had been found during the construction of the Iberville Housing Projects, on the site of the old Storyville Iberville was the housing project where I&039;d killed a vamp, where Derek Lee lived Curious, I opened the file

It was set up a lot like the Magna Carta, with a prearaphs of ina Carta had thirty-seven paragraphs The Vampira Carta had twenty-two I wondered which doculish, or maybe Latin; fortunately, a translation started at the bottoraph read:

Preamble: Jules, Blood Master by the shaland, Ireland, and Aquitaine, sends soles to all to who the liberties of the dead and living, we subreat charter to the Blood Master of Europe, the lord Lucius, our father of the Mithrans

I turned the page There wasn&039;t another The translation stopped, or the next page had been reh the history folder, but the rest of the translation was gone, or had never existed I set the pages on the table and quickly snapped off six shots, folded the history info back up, and went to work on other stuff I wondered if the vamp council would let me have a translated copy of the carta, and what kind of story I&039;d have to use to get them to hand it over

At the back of the file was a handwritten list in pencil on lined paper, of names and words titled Anomalies When I read theuilera - shaen?

Bethany NLN - sha? related to Sabina?), Cross? Third gen? War?

Sons of Darkness? What the hell are they?

There was no sig line At soation, and he&039;d clearly been left with so nosy The words were too faint to photograph I didn&039;t recognize the blocky handwriting and when I sniffed the page, the scent signature was unfa tobacco smoke, as if the writer had been a two-pack-a-dayer But so about the list felt important, so I copied it into my little spiral notebook, then texted it to myself, just in case I wasn&039;t allowed to leave with notes, and went back to the files

The cops had done a history on each of the clans, and rather than read the info here, I took h for later reading I continued searching the cabinets and ca persons reports - with a reference to file number 666-0W I checked the other cabinets but all of the of keys Rick had carried Shrugging, I settled to the one I had And I spotted a red folder A quick search told me there weren&039;t many of thely of Jodi Richoux It was the file she&039;d been putting in the drahile she lookedin Jodi&039;s file were children and teens, all within the last twenty-five years, ten of theht, all were under eighteen, all itch children The chill I&039;d been feeling off and on settled across raphs and the reports

All of theht It was circumstantial, but could vaain

The last witch child had vanished three o beyond interviews and I wondered howto find the little witches NOPD had a well-publicized antipathy to witches that deepened following the witch debacle of Katrina, when a lone witch coven tried to turn a category-five hurricane away froot it down to a cat three, but they couldn&039;t turn it Their efforts and poeren&039;t enough; the old, poorly built levees failed; thousands died in New Orleans and across the Gulf Coast froh toof witch children for decades? I hoped not But I had a bad feeling about it

The MPRs weren&039;t up to date, but they indicated the direction of the investigation -

back into the witch coured was a smart place to start Over the last decade, it looked as if every knoitch above twelve years of age had been questioned, and soator Elizabeth Caldwell Itto me, but I could pump Rick later And then I re across his features His eyes on Angelina above me, his nostrils wide as he took her scent Leo couldn&039;t be involved with the disappearing kids Yet the thought iced across my shoulders and down my spine like sleet, sharp as frozen knives

I spent the next hour photographing police files I didn&039;t knohat I was looking for until I found a folder with twenty-seven police reports in it The reports were cases of atteue vamp attacks They too went back some twenty years

A heated frisson of certainty sizzled over my skin This was it

The reports were in no particular order, so I spread theuesses, I pushed any reports that ue attacks went into another Once I got thes, unclaimed by any clan I wanted the addresses of the attacks so I could situate them on afor a map application on my cell phone, I jotted notes, texted the Then I photographed the pages Info in triplicate I wasso not losing this

On a hunch, I did a quick comparison to see if any witch disappearances correlated with the young-rogue attacks and was disappointed to discover that none correlated exactly; they eeks apart in soh to make me curious

Before I put them away, I sniffed the reports Three of the oldest reports sarette tobacco on the anomaly list All of them had been handled by Jodi

Satisfied, I put the behind

I looked at the locked door And around the room No landline phone Hadn&039;t Rick told me to call his desk when I was done? I checked my cell No bars I had texted a lot of stuff to myself and the info would be in my sent texts, but stillI was locked in

Beast woke and snarled She did not like cages

Holding her down, I knocked on the door, and before the second tap, it opened A wrinkled patrol officer stood there, poorly shaven and overweight I could have sworn that was powdered sugar on his shirt, like froured it was i like racial profiling Could you do e? And would it be politically incorrect?

Not feeling my usual cop-induced nervousness, I s Annoyed

"What?" he said roughly, seeing so in my eyes he didn&039;t like "You done?"

"Umalmost I need to use the ladies&039; room"

He shook his head, turned away, and waved hts of stairs and waited outside while I went in I pulled the phone and the camera&039;s memory chips, discovered that I had two bars, and uploaded all the photographs to a secure Web site I&039;d had created last year It was a fail-safe in case my camera and my notes were confiscated on the way out

I started to sweat halfway through It was taking too long After twelve minutes, the officer opened the door to inquire after my health That wasn&039;t quite what he said, but it was kinder than his "Hey, lady I&039;ot work to do"

New Orleans&039;s finest and best

I finished, forced ht, and walked out "Not feeling too good," I told the guard, holding erated dinner"

"Yeah," he said "We got a lot a&039; pukers in the hospital You need to go?"

"No I&039; a mental head shake I saw the metal detector just ahead and put my hand out for a shake "Thanks I can find my way out from here"

The cop looked at , "No offense, lady, but you just finished being sick in the toilet"

I nodded and droppedme with no witnesses I didn&039;t see Rick on the way out, but I did set off the metal detector I pulled my cell out ofin the door, who shook his head Feeling a spurt of relieved adrenaline, I jogged out of NOPD and slapped the rain off the bike seat That was one problem with bikes, even totally cool ones like Bitsa No protection from the elements I sat on the wet leather, hel out into the day I hadn&039;t had much sleep and I needed a nap

Back ho beef perer to change and hunt It had been days and she was getting antsy, which made her more likely to try to take control, to play me as she played with her dinner when it was still alive "Not yet," I said to her