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to talk to her. He had a soothing sort of manner, and the gentle tone of voice he used made her feel a little less...lost."Someone you knew, right?" Hess said. "Can you tell me what happened?""I--" Claire suddenly realized that she had a decision to make: tell about the whole reason she and Eve and Michael had come over, or lie and pretend like it was just another of those wacky Morganville coincidences. She didn't feel like lying, though. Not to Detective Hess. "It's Doug--Doug Legrande. He was my lab partner in Professor Larkin's class. He took something he shouldn't have, and I came to ask him to give it back."Detective Hess was a hell of a lot sharper than most people in Morganville, and he gave her a sideways look as he said very casually, "Would that thing be something that some people in town wouldn't want to get out?""Blood," she said, keeping her voice in a whisper. "You know what kind of blood.""I do. So, tell me what happened when you got here." And he slowly walked her through it, step by step, from the beginning. He'd also walked her off a little from her friends, and Claire saw that Detective Lowe was talking to Eve, while Michael had Hannah as a conversational partner. Double-checking facts, Claire guessed. The low-key way it was done made her feel a lot less nervous. By the time she was finished, Detective Lowe had finished up with Eve and was sitting on the back bumper of the gray car, making notes with a pad and pen as he talked to Chief Moses. Hannah had notes, too."Did we do anything wrong?" Claire finally asked, as Hess jotted down something, as well. "I mean, we tried to do the right thing. For Doug.""You probably would have been better off reporting it immediately," Hess said. That was one thing she liked a lot about him: he was kind about it, but he told her the truth, no matter how difficult it was to hear it. "I can't say this wouldn't have still happened, because we can't jump to the conclusion that his theft had anything to do with his murder, but you need to understand that if it did, Doug didn't have to die. He might have been in jail, but he would have been safer. Understand?"She did, and she felt miserable...but, oddly, also more centered. It was what she'd been thinking, anyway. Hearing him say it didn't make her feel any worse; it made it real enough that she could move on, accept it as a mistake, and plan to never let it happen again."I'm sorry," she said. She wasn't sure if Hess understood, but she thought he probably did."You're learning," he said. "Sometimes those lessons come harder than others. I'm glad you're all right.""Thank you." She cleared her throat. "Um, how have you been? I haven't seen you since, you know..." She didn't know how to put it. They all avoided talking about Mr. Bishop, definitely the coldest vampire she'd ever met; he'd been cruel, calculating, and way too powerful. The fact that they'd survived his attempt to take over Morganville had been amazing...but nobody wanted to risk going through that again."Yeah, since that," Hess said. "We've been working. Travis took a vacation for six months, out of town. Other than that, the usual. This is the first outright murder we've had in a while, though."He didn't sound either bothered or excited about it. Just businesslike. Claire didn't know what to say to that, but it didn't seem to matter. He walked her back over to the police cars and went to consult with Hannah and his partner."You take me the most interesting places," Eve was saying to Michael when she rejoined them. "Murder scenes, interrogations..."He hugged her silently. Overhead, thunder boomed and the first drops of rain began to fall. A police officer brought them a collapsible umbrella from his squad car, and the three of them stood in its shelter as the rain poured down and the police started their investigation. By the time it let up, Hannah said they could leave. Claire said good-bye to her friends, picked up her backpack from the coffee shop, and then went straight to Myrnin."It's possible," Myrnin was muttering to himself as he paced the floor of the lab. "Entirely possible. Likely, even."Claire, coming down the steps from the entrance, dumped her book bag at the usual strategic location--meaning it was equally accessible whether she needed to defend herself or make a quick exit. She was used to coming into the middle of Myrnin's conversations with himself. "What's possible?" she asked."Anything," he said absently. "But that's not what I was talking about. Oh, hello, Claire. You're in good time. I need an extra pair of hands.""As long as I keep them attached," she said, which earned her a startled stare."The things you say to me, you'd think I was some sort of monster. Oh, here, help me with this." He gestured to one of the lab tables, which held some gleaming new device with brass fittings and--as always with Myrnin--pipes, wires, and some kind of strange-looking vacuum tubes. "I need it over there." He pointed to an empty table across the room. And then he kept on pacing, his white lab coat (a recent discovery of his; he thought it made him look more official) flaring around him. It was somewhat spoiled by the flopping bunny slippers, their fangs showing with every step. Oh. He wasn't going to help her move it. Well, of course he wasn't. Myrnin could have picked it up with one hand and carried it easily from one spot to another, but he was busy thinking. Carrying things was her job. Today, anyway. Claire picked up the engine--if that was what it was--and staggered with it over to the other table. It felt as if he'd packed it with lead, and knowing Myrnin, that wasn't much of a stretch. It smelled like blood and flowers, and she hesitated to even guess what its purpose might have been."What's possible?" she asked again, leaning against the table and trying to work the kinks out of her arms after stretching them about six inches with the weight of that stupid thing , whatever it was. Myrnin was muttering under his breath, but he paused and glanced at her, even though he kept pacing. "That your friend was murdered by someone who believed he had a drug. Perhaps he was trying to sell the blood.""How did you hear about that already?" She was surprised, because she'd meant to tell him all about it. Myrnin waved that away."Interesting news travels quickly in a town as boring as this," he said. "Also, I tend to monitor police broadcasts. Your name was mentioned in connection with the investigation. I made a few calls to find out the rest. So, do you think he was trying to develop some sort of drug?""Myrnin, Doug was stinky, but he wasn't crazy. There may be people in Morganville who will just take any old thing to see if it gets them high, but he just saw that blood boil under the lights. He wasn't not going to try to sell it as a drug.""You'd be very surprised what people get up to. But, in any case, it's possible someone else understood the potential of it, and Doug was simply collateral damage." Myrnin sighed. "I understand it was quite bloody. What a terrible waste."He didn't mean of Doug, of course. He didn't know Doug, and Claire doubted he would have really cared. No, Myrnin was talking about the waste of plasma. Which made Claire shiver, and reminded her again that no matter how cute and cuddly Myrnin could sometimes be, there was something about him that just...wasn't quite right. Not for a human, anyway."Frank!" Myrnin yelled, making her jump. "Do you have any insights to share? At all?"Frank Collins's voice came out of every speaker in the room--the old radio set in the corner, the newer TV mounted on the wall, the computer on the antique desk, and Claire's own cell phone in her pocket. "You don't have to yell. Believe me, I can hear you. Wish to hell I could shut you off.""Well, you can't, and I need your particular expertise," Myrnin said. He sounded smug and a little bit vindictive; Myrnin didn't like Frank, Frank didn't like anybody who drank plasma, and the whole thing was just plain weird. Because Frank Collins, Shane's dad, had once been a badass vampire-hunting criminal, and then Mr. Bishop had made him a self-loathing vampire, and now he was...dead. She was listening to a dead man speaking over the radio. Well, not dead , exactly. After Frank had died saving Claire and Shane, Myrnin had scooped out his still-sort-of-living brain, stuck it in a plasma bath, and hooked it up to a computer. Frank Collins was now the brain that ran Morganville, and, thankfully, Shane didn't know. Claire could honestly not imagine how that conversation was going to go when he found out. It made her ill to even try to imagine it."This would go easier if you'd show your face," Myrnin said. "Please. You may be assured that by please , I mean do it , or I'll put an injection of something nasty in your plasma.""Myrnin!" Claire blurted, wide-eyed. He shrugged."You have no idea how difficult he's been lately. I thought ada was a problem, but she was positively the model of decorum next to this one," he said. "Well? I'm waiting, Frank."In the corner, a faint shadow appeared, a blur of static that resolved into a flat image on the three-dimensional background. He wasn't bothering with a color image; maybe Frank thought shades of gray made him look more badass. If so, he was right. His computer image looked years younger than Claire had last seen him. He had grungy good looks, though his hair was long and messy, and he still had a wicked bad scar on his face. He was dressed in black leather, including a jacket with lots of silver buckles, and big, stomping boots. "Better?" his voice asked. The image's mouth moved, but his voice still came in surround sound from the speakers. "And if you mess with me, I'll hit you back, you bloodsucking geek. Don't think I can't."Myrnin smiled, fangs down. "Well, you can try ," he almost purred. "Now. Let's have a chat about the criminal elements of Morganville, since you have such a fine and intimate acquaintance with them."Frank's 2-D avatar didn't have much in the way of facial expression, but, then, Frank in 3-D form hadn't been big on emoting, either. His voice, however, was full of sarcasm. "Always glad to be of help to the vampire community," he said. "We all know there is no crime in Morganville. And the humans are all just happy to be here. It's paradise on earth. Ain't that what it says in the brochure?"Myrnin lost his smile, and his dark eyes got that dangerously hot look that made Claire nervous. "I suppose you think you're irreplaceable in your current position," he said. "You're a brain in a jar, Frank. By definition, you are eminently replaceable."Now Frank's avatar smiled. It seemed just as artificial as the rest of him. "Then pull the plug, if you think you can do better."Myrnin's gaze slid to Claire, and she felt that chill again, the one that rushed from the bottom of her spine right up to the top of her head. He didn't say anything. He didn't have to. She knew he'd always thought she was a better candidate for the brain-in-a-jar thing--which meant he thought she'd be easier to control. Frank had just been at the right, or wrong, place at the right time to take her place. That could always change. Frank must have figured that out, too, because he said, "You touch my kid's girl, and