Morganville (Justin Bieber)

Chapter 74

The dead girl that Justin had taken to the church was Jeanne Jackson, a sophomore who'd gone missing from a sorority party two nights before. The papers said that she'd been raped and strangled, but nothing about suspects, and no cops showed up to interrogate Justin, much to my relief. He'd done a dumbass thing, but I could understand his paranoia. In Morganville, he was one suspicion away from taking up residence in Jason's old cell, whether he'd actually done anything or not.

That was, if the vampires didn't decide to hold their own brand of frontier justice.

Captain Obvious's Fang Report had a much more detailed article on the killings, linking the other two that I knew about with this one, and speculating that instead of a vampire menace, they might be dealing with a human one this time. He didn't seem as enthusiastic about forming up vigilante parties for someone with a pulse, I noticed. Not that it mattered to the dead girls which type of monster had killed them.

I got a note from Amelie giving me time off from working with Myrnin for the rest of the week, so I devoted myself to keeping up with classes. They were tougher than I was used to, which was kind of a relief. I loved a good challenge, and the professors seemed to actually care whether or not their students had a clue. Myth and Legend wasn't what I'd expected, not at all; it wasn't Greek gods, or even Native American Trickster stories. No, it was about ... vampires. Comparative vampires, actually, examining the literature and folklore from earliest recorded history to the latest vampire-as-hero in pop culture. (Which, now that I thought about it, kind of was the modern-day version of myth and legend.) Oddly, for Morganville, the professor wasn't skipping the parts about vampire-killing methods, but I guessed that I was one of the few in the class who'd ever know the score about the town, anyway. The rest would bumble cluelessly through their one or two years, transfer out to bigger schools, and never know they'd rubbed elbows at parties with real monsters.

I kept my mouth shut about anything that might get me in trouble, because the professor had a bracelet, too. I was trying to match up glyphs with vampires, and I thought he probably belonged to a female vamp named Susan, who seemed to be into finance. Susan owned a lot of property, anyway, and was some kind of bigwig at the Morganville Bank and Trust.

I began keeping notes in a special book about glyphs, vampires, who owned what. Not because I had any agenda, but just because it was interesting, and could be useful someday. I supposed if I'd asked Amelie would have told me all about it, but it was more challenging to figure it out myself -- and this way, Amelie couldn't be really sure how much I knew, which couldn't be a bad thing. She's nice when it suits her. That doesn't mean she's nice.

And on Friday, Eve left a note stuck to the bathroom mirror for me to find when she got up.

A. - Don't forget tonight is the party. Objective: look hotter than Monica and make everybody totally forget who threw the party in the first place. Outfit on back of door. Pay me back. -- E.

The outfit was nothing I would ever, ever, ever have bought for myself. For one thing, the black leather skirt was ... short. Like, really short. There were some kind of patterned pantyhose, and a red sheer shirt with big red roses woven into the fabric in flocked material. And a black cami to go under it.

There was another sticky note attached to the skirt. Shoes under the cabinet. I looked. They were thick clunky platforms, in my size, in shiny patent leather.

I took it all back into my bedroom and put it down, backed off, and stared at it for a few seconds. I can't wear that. It's not me.

Eve would totally mock me if I wore my blue jeans to the party. And she'd gone to a lot of trouble, because all of this stuff was my size, not Eve's. Even the shoes.