Blood Rites by Jim Butcher Page A

They aren't gentle and fun-loving like the Reds."
    "Meaning?"
    "Meaning that when they feed, their victims don't usually survive. They don't feed as often, but the longer they stay, the more people are going to get killed."
    Murphy's eyes glittered with a sudden, angry fire. "What's the plan?"
    "Find them. Kill them."
    Her brows shot up. "Just like that? No formal balls, no masquerades, no clandestine meetings as preliminaries?"
    "Nah. I thought it might be nice to get the drop on the bad guys for a change."
    "I like that plan."
    "It's simple," I agreed.
    "Like you," Murphy said.
    "Just like me."
    "When?"
    I shook my head. "As soon as I find where they're holed up during daylight. I can probably do it in a day or three."
    "How's Saturday?"
    "Uh. Why?"
    She rolled her eyes. "Murphy annual family reunion is this weekend. I try to be working on reunion weekend."
    "Oh," I said. "Why don't you just, you know… not show up."
    "I need a good excuse not to show up, or my mother won't let me hear the end of it."
    "So lie."
    Murphy shook her head. "She'd know. She's psychic or something."
    I felt my eyebrows go up. "Well, gee, Murph. I guess I'll just try to arrange things so that the deadly monster threat will be convenient to ducking your annual family fun-fest. Your sense of priorities once more astounds me."
    She grimaced. "Sorry. I spend time dreading this every year. Things are sort of hard between me and my mother. Family skews your sanity. I don't expect you to under—"
    She broke off abruptly, and a little pang of hurt went through me. She didn't expect me to understand. I didn't have a mother. I didn't have a family. I never had. Even my dim memories of my father had all but vanished. I'd been only six years old when he died.
    "God, Harry," Murph said. "I wasn't thinking. I'm sorry."
    I coughed and focused on the sequence. "It shouldn't be a long job. I find the vamps. We go in, pound in some stakes, cut some heads, toss some holy water, and we're gone."
    She began to speed the pace, evidently as glad as I to leave that comment unremarked. The strength of her swings made my hands buzz when her staff hit mine. "You mean we get to live the cliché?" she asked. "Stakes and crosses and garlic?"
    "Yeah. Cakewalk."
    Murphy snorted. "Then why do you need thugs?"
    "In case they have goons. I need thugpower with countergoon capability."
    Murphy nodded. "A few extra hands wouldn't be a bad idea." She sped up again, her staff a blur. I had to struggle to keep up. "Why don't you ask the holy knight guy?"
    "No," I said.
    "What if we need him?"
    "Michael would come in a hot second if I asked him. But I'm tired of seeing him get hurt because of me." I frowned, almost lost the rhythm, then found it again. "God or someone like Him does Michael's event scheduling, and I get the feeling that Michael's a lot less invincible when he isn't officially on the clock."
    "But he's a big boy. I mean, he knows the risks. He has brains."
    "He also has kids."
    Murphy faltered this time, and I hit one of her thumbs. She winced and nodded toward the rookie cop she'd humbled. "O'Toole there is Mickey Malone's nephew. He'd jump through fire for you, if I asked him along."
    "God, no. No newbies on this run. A stupid mistake could be fatal."
    "I could talk to Stallings."
    I shook my head. "Murph, the boys in SI are a lot better at handling supernatural weirdness than the average bear—but a lot of them still don't really believe what they're dealing with. I want someone smart and tough, and who won't freeze or freak out, and that's you."
    "They're better than that."
    "What happens to them if something goes wrong? If I make a mistake. Or you do. Even if they got out in one piece, how do you think they would handle the backlash when they got back to the real world? Where people don't believe in vampires, and there are bodies to explain?"
    Murphy frowned. "The same thing that would happen to me, I guess."
    "Yeah. But you're their leader. You want to be