Neck Deep In Vampires (A BBW Urban Fantasy) by Georgette St. Clair Read Free Book Online

precious to us.  The location is perfect, our power is very strong because of where we live, and the loss of the land would be a tremendous blow to our coven. December Cornwall, the High Priestess, is known for fighting dirty.” She sighed.  “We’re hoping she hasn’t managed to get to the judge.”
    “So how does this relate to the missing familiars?”
    “I suspect that either December is behind it, or, frankly, I hate to say it, but Narcissa can’t be ruled out.  My sister would benefit by undermining me and making me look weak; December would benefit by distracting us and causing us to turn against each other.”
    “What about Leona? Did she want the position of High Priestess?”
    “Oh, no.  She’s never been interested in power. She flits from one thing to another, one job to another. And she doesn’t like conflict, which pretty much comes with the job description. She made it very clear to my mother from early on that she wouldn’t want to be High Priestess.”
    I nodded. “All right. What is that you want me to do?”
    “I know that you can read minds, and you can compel people to tell you the truth,” she said. “I’d like you to question the people that might have any knowledge of what happened.”
    I considered this. “ Well, as I mentioned last night, I normally am very reluctant to use those powers, but given that your familiars are missing and in grave danger, I’ll make an exception. Tell me some more about what’s going on.”
    “Well, the familiars have disappeared at night.  Normally, they roam around the sub division freely, and sometimes they go over the subdivision walls, but they always return by morning.  Over the past month, half a dozen of them have not returned.   With the first couple, we thought they might have just had an accident, been hit by a car, taken by a wild animal – it can happen, of course. However, the fact that they are not dead, and the fact that so many of them disappeared…” she glanced nervously at Snowdrop.
    “ Last night another one disappeared.  It was an orange tabby named Pumpkin. His owner last saw him in the afternoon, he told her he was going to go out for a bit and promised to be in before dark. He never came back.  We have video cameras in place all around the perimeter; we’re reviewing it, but we haven’t found any footage of him yet.  We also have security guards. I’d like you to speak to the head of security, Thomas Diamond, and see if he knows anything.  Then, I’d like you to speak to the veterinarian who treats all of our familiars. She works in the community, but she lives in Bay Breeze and she’s also a witch.  I’d also like you to talk with the woman who sells us all of our pet food. Those two women are the only thing I can think of that all the familiars have in common.”
    She wrote down the names and addre sses of everybody concerned, and told me where I could find them, and gave me her cell phone number.
    “I’ll get started tonight,” I told her.
    She thanked me and left.
    There was one thing I needed to do before I put my She rlock Holmes cap on.  I told Camille I was going to go lie down in my room for a little while.  Then I locked the door and lay down on my bed.
    I needed an update on what Andreas was up to these days, but I couldn’t bear to look in his head.
    I’d made the mistake of doing that a month earlier, and caught him in the middle of torturing a Thrall.
    Rem embering it still sent a wave of nausea and despair rushing through me. I felt a cold sweat popping up on my forehead as I struggled without success to banish the memory from my mind.
    For me to read a person’s mind without them knowing it, especially a vampire as powerful as Andreas, requires a lot of concentration. It had taken all of my strength to quickly pull out of Andreas’ mind at the time without being noticed.   Ever since then, when I wanted to check in on Andreas, I read the minds of his servants. I’d met several of