Zeke, a reporter with schizo-affective paranoia, gets caught up in a vamp-motivated murder.
Zeke's best work is drafted during "medicinal vacations," where he uses his condition to aid his writing process, short term memory be damned. However, the l...
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"You know you can talk to me," Raffi said, for the second time.
For the second time, Zeke responded with a noncommittal grunt, stuffing eggs into his mouth. As his cousin assessed him, he popped a pill into his mouth.
"I'm out," Zeke noted, waving the empty bottle in Raffi's face.
"I can pick you up some more. I know a guy."
She always seemed to know a guy.
Zeke shook his head. "I do, too. I'll pick it up."
Raffi's fork clattered on her plate. "You damn well will not. You're hiding out, wanted for double homicide."
He cringed at the naked reminder, but of course, that's what she'd intended. To remind him of the deep shit he was in.
"I can't stay in here. I need a break. I'm going crazy."
He knew he'd been wasting time. Precious days had passed, days when he could of been doing what he was trained to do, investigating. Yet, the more he'd discovered, the less he wanted to know.
Though a sense of obligation urged Zeke to tell Raffi about his nightmare, a deep shame still held him back. That confused him, because he had confessed everything to Raffi, who didn't seem capable of judging anyone. But the shame burned brightly, anyhow.
"First off," Raffi said, chuckling. "You're already crazy. Secondly, I understand. You've been cooped up, but out of necessity. Until we figure out where Carter is, you need to stay put."
From Campbell's info, and the sightings, they'd concluded that Carter was alive, at least in the body-snatcher type of way. Raffi's contacts at the morgue confirmed Carter's body had indeed been transferred to a funeral home, then cremated.
"Carter isn't anywhere," Zeke said.
Raffi nodded. "Vamps never revealed that they could bite somebody, and then fucking look like them. We're in new territory." She finished chewing, releasing a belch like nobody's business.
"Goddamn," he remarked, more out of admiration than disgust. Then, a spark from his old self pushed through to ask, "How did you get Campbell to tell you that, if it's such a big vamp secret?"
It seemed an important piece of the puzzle, tied to a larger piece. So, he hoped he'd phrased the question as casually as possible.
Raffi wiped her mouth with a napkin, smiling. "I have my methods of persuasion."
The fact that she'd dodged the question did not escape him. So he tried again, digging deeper.
"Is Campbell alive?"
The smile froze on Raffi's face. An agonizing second ticked by before she laughed. "Still something of a reporter, I see."
Zeke noted that she had avoided answering twice in a row.
If he had been writing a story, and interviewing Raffi on the street, he would have pushed her. Given that he was a fugitive, and there was but two exits, he decided against pushy.
In the second it had taken Raffi to recover, he had formulated several theories about how her date with Campbell had really gone.
Raffi plucked the empty bottle from his hands, saying, "Let's get you more of these before you get too paranoid, eh?"
Whatever pills she brought back, he wouldn't swallow a single one.
