Kitty and the Silver Bullet

  The characters and events in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.

  Copyright © 2008 by Carrie Vaughn

  Excerpt from the author’s next book copyright © 2008 by Carrie Vaughn. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review.

  Grand Central Publishing

  Hachette Book Group

  237 Park Avenue

  New York, NY 10017

  Visit our Web site at www.HachetteBookGroup.com

  Grand Central Publishing is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  The Grand Central Publishing name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  First eBook Edition: January 2008

  ISBN-13: 978-0-446-51112-4

  Contents

  Raves for Carrie Vaughn’s Novels

  Books by Carrie Vaughn

  Dedication

  Acknowledgments

  The Playlist

  chapter 1

  chapter 2

  chapter 3

  chapter 4

  chapter 5

  chapter 6

  chapter 7

  chapter 8

  chapter 9

  chapter 10

  chapter 11

  chapter 12

  chapter 13

  chapter 14

  chapter 15

  chapter 16

  Epilogue

  About the Author

  More Kitty!

  RAVES FOR CARRIE VAUGHN’S NOVELS

  KITTY TAKES A HOLIDAY

  “Vaughn’s universe is convincing and imaginative.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “With the expected wit, action, and romance, Kitty takes us on an enjoyable jaunt through a life most entertaining . . . a captivating urban fantasy.”

  —RomRevToday.com

  KITTY GOES TO WASHINGTON

  “[A] fun beach read.”

  —Kansas City Star

  “Fans of Kitty and The Midnight Hour will be pleased with this fast-paced follow-up.”

  —MonstersAndCritics.com

  “A fabulous satirical tale that humorously spoofs the supernatural element in literature and the U.S. Senate.”

  —HarrietKlausner.wwwi.com

  “Sure to satisfy Vaughn’s many fans and earn her some new ones.”

  —CurledUp.com

  “A satisfying chick-lit read.”

  —WantzUponaTime.com

  “A wonderful cast of secondaries adds to the story’s marvelous appeal.”

  —BookLoons.com

  “Funny, heart-wrenching, and thought-provoking.”

  —VampireGenre.com

  “The cunning sneakiness and courage that Kitty shows is something that most females strive for. This book is definitely a page-turner and well worth picking up.”

  —HorrorChannel.com

  “Carrie Vaughn is a real gem, and she’s definitely on my playlist.”

  —BookFetish.org

  KITTY AND THE MIDNIGHT HOUR

  “I relished this book. Enough excitement, astonishment, pathos, and victory to satisfy any reader.”

  —Charlaine Harris, New York Times bestselling author

  “Fresh, hip, fantastic . . . Don’t miss this one. You’re in for a real treat!”

  —L. A. Banks, author of The Vampire Huntress Legends series

  “You’ll love this! At last, a most entertaining werewolf novel. This is vintage Anita Blake meets The Howling. Worth reading twice!”

  —Barb and J. C. Hendee, coauthors of Dhampir

  “A fun, fast-paced adventure.”

  —Locus

  “Entertaining . . . a surprisingly human tale.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Kitty is a lively, engaging heroine with a strong independent streak.”

  —Library Journal

  “A thriller and a page-turner. An exciting read . . . you’ll love this!”

  —Alice Borchardt, author of Raven Warrior

  “Do you like werewolves? Talk radio? Vampires? Reading? Sex? If the answer to any of those is ‘yes,’ you’re in for a wonderful ride.”

  —Gene Wolfe, author of The Wizard

  “Intriguing . . . a coming-of-age story with a twist, developing a unique take on the werewolf mythos to tell a tale of female empowerment and self-discovery . . . Vaughn expertly makes use of lupine senses and instincts as metaphors for the wildness striving to break free in all of us.”

  —Susan Krinard, author of To Tame a Wolf

  “A well-paced and exciting story . . . Not many books these days are able to grip me enough that I stay up reading them when I should go to bed. This one did.”

  —Mythprint

  “Vaughn’s clever new take on the supernatural is edgy and irreverent . . . will have readers clamoring for the next installment.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews Magazine

  “A light touch, conversational tone, and entertaining premise . . . very appealing.”

  —VOYA

  “Just when you thought nobody could put a new spin on werewolves and vampires, along comes Carrie Vaughn to prove otherwise.”

  —BookLoons.com

  “A howling good urban-fantasy novel.”

  —FreshFiction.com

  “Sure to be a hit . . . Don’t wait for the full moon to pick up your copy!”

  —RomRevToday.com

  “The prose flows so smoothly . . . skillfully handled.”

  —Trashotron.com

  BOOKS BY CARRIE VAUGHN

  Kitty and The Midnight Hour

  Kitty Goes to Washington

  Kitty Takes a Holiday

  Kitty and the Silver Bullet

  For My Family

  Acknowledgments

  Barry Fishler deserves all due credit for the title. Jo Anne Vaughn and Mike Bateman read the rough drafts for me. Max Campanella looked over the gun stuff and took me shooting. Brian Whitehead kept calling me, demanding blood—I hope this satisfies him. In 2005, Jean Hortman read the ARC of the first book in less than two hours at a party and since then has poured out fountains of encouragement and sanity checks, for which I’m eternally grateful.

  As usual, my editor Jaime Levine made this a better book. Thanks also to Ashley Grayson and Company, for herding cats, or Kitty, as it were.

  The Playlist

  Billie Holiday, “They Can’t Take That Away From Me”

  Shonen Knife, “Milky Way”

  Pretenders, “Talk of the Town”

  The Clash, “Clash City Rockers”

  Creedence Clearwater Revival, “Commotion”

  Stephen “Tintin” Duffy, “Kiss Me”

  Sinead O’Connor, “You Do Something to Me”

  Peggy Lee, “Fever”

  Front 242, “The Untold”

  The Dresden Dolls, “Missed Me”

  The Supremes, “Where Did Our Love Go”

  The Beatles, “Hey Bulldog”

  Depeche Mode, “Home”

  chapter 1

  I hated the smell of this place: concrete and institutional. Antiseptic. But all the cleaning in the world couldn’t cover up the unhappiness, the sourness, the faint smell of urine. The anger.

  The guard at the door of the visiting room pointed me and Ben to empty chairs at a table on one side of a glass partition. The room held half a dozen cubicles like this. Only a phone line would connect us to the other side.

  I was shaking. I didn’t like coming here. Well, I did, and I did
n’t. I wanted to see him, but even being here as a visitor made me feel trapped. The Wolf side didn’t handle it very well. Ben squeezed my hand under the table.

  “You okay?” he said. Ben had been coming here once a week to see Cormac. I didn’t come quite as often—once a month, for five months now. I’d never get used to this. In fact, it seemed to get harder every time, not easier. I was so tense, just being here exhausted me.

  “I think so,” I said. “But this place makes me nervous.”

  “Don’t let him see you upset,” he whispered. “We’re supposed to be supportive.”

  “I know. Sorry.” I held his hand with both of mine and tried to stop the trembling. I was supposed to be the strong one. I was supposed to be the one who helped Ben keep it together, not the other way around.

  On the other side of the glass, a guard led out a man wearing an orange prison jumpsuit. His light brown hair was cut shorter than it used to be, which made his face seem more gaunt. I tried to convince myself that he wasn’t thinner. His mustache was the same as always. So was his stoic frown.

  My smile felt stiff and fake. Cormac would know it was fake. Had to be cheerful, couldn’t let him see me upset.

  He was handcuffed. When he picked up the phone to talk to us, he had to hold both hands up to his face. Ben held our phone between us. Leaning close, we could both hear.

  “Hey,” Ben said.

  “Hey.” Cormac smiled. Broke my heart, him smiling like that behind the glass. “Thanks for coming.”

  “How you doing?”

  Cormac shrugged. “Hanging in there. No worries.”

  He was here on felony manslaughter charges. He’d killed to save my life, and now he was serving time for it. I owed him a huge debt, which hung on me like lead weights.

  It could have been worse. The only way we could all sit here smiling at each other was thinking of how much worse it had almost been. One or all of us dead, Cormac in here for life—

  He didn’t seem to begrudge me the debt. Right from the start, he’d approached the prison sentence as doing penance, just like he was supposed to. Just another obstacle to overcome, another river to cross.

  Ben handled this better than I did. “You need anything? Besides a cake with a file baked in?”

  “No. Just more of the same.”

  I’d been ordering books for him. It had started out as a joke after I’d accused him of being illiterate. Then it turned earnest. Reading kept his mind off being trapped. Kept him from going crazy.

  “Any requests?” I said, and Ben tipped the mouthpiece so he could hear me.

  Cormac shook his head. “I’m not picky. Whatever you think is good.” I had a list of classics I was feeding him. But no Dostoyevsky.

  We had an hour for small talk. Very small talk. I couldn’t say I’m sorry, because then I’d get upset. Leave on a happy note. Ben and I wanted to make sure Cormac got out of here in one piece, or at least not any more damaged than he was when he went in.

  “Would you believe some of the guys listen to your show?” Cormac said.

  “Really? That’s kind of weird.”

  “I tell them you’re not that mean in person. I’m ruining your reputation.”

  “Great,” I said, smirking. “Thanks.” Ben chuckled.

  “You two look good,” Cormac said, leaning back in his chair. “You look good together.” His smile turned satisfied, almost. Comforted.

  He’d told us both to look after each other. Like he couldn’t trust either of us to take care of ourselves, but together we’d be okay. He was probably right. Ben and I had cobbled together our little pack of two, and we were doing okay. But it still felt like we were missing something. He was sitting across from us, on the other side of the glass. And we were all pretending like everything was okay.

  A guard loomed behind Cormac. Time’s up.

  “I’ll see you next week,” Ben said.

  Cormac said, to me specifically, “Thanks for coming. Everyone in here’s ugly as shit. It’s nice to see a pretty face once in a while.”

  Which broke my heart again. There had to be more I could do than sit here and be a pretty face, however pretty I could possibly be with my pale skin, blond hair tied in a short, scruffy ponytail, and eyes on the verge of crying. I wanted to touch the glass, but that would have been such a cliché and hopeless gesture.

  He put the phone back, stood, and was gone. He always walked away without turning to look, and we always stayed to watch him go until he was out of sight.

  Ben put his hand on my shoulder, urging me away. Hand in hand, in silence, we left the prison gates and emerged into too-bright summer sun and a baking parking lot. Quietly we slipped into the car, Ben in the driver’s seat. Then the blowup happened.

  He closed the door, settled for a moment, then hit the steering wheel with a closed fist. Then again, and again, throwing his whole body into it. The car rocked. I just watched.

  After a moment, he slouched back. He gripped the steering wheel, bracing himself. “I hate this. I hate that he’s in there, and there’s nothing I can do.”

  He blamed himself as much as I blamed myself. If I hadn’t needed saving, if Ben had found the right legal out—and there was Cormac, accepting it all without complaint. He and Cormac were cousins. They’d grown up together, looked out for each other, and now they were helpless.

  I touched his forearm and squeezed, like I could push out the tension. He sighed.

  “Let’s get out of here,” I said.

  Friday night, time to party.

  “Good evening, and welcome to The Midnight Hour. I’m Kitty Norville, your ever-cheerful hostess. Tonight it’s all vampires, and all calls. I want to hear from you about those mysterious bloodsuckers of the night. Questions, problems, nothing’s off-limits. Tell me a story I’ve never heard before. It’s getting pretty tough to scare me these days, but I’d like you to try. Or even better—let’s see if someone out there can give me a little hope. I’ve had one of those days.”

  I was such a lucky girl. After doing this show for two years, my monitor still lit up with calls. My listeners had been waiting with their fingers on the speed-dial button. One of these days, I’d ask for calls and the phones would come up silent. Then I’d have to retire for sure. But this wasn’t that night.

  “Our first call this evening comes from . . . Maledar . . . Maledar? Is that right?”

  “Yes, it is.” The light male voice managed to drip with pretension.

  “Your parents actually named you Maledar.”

  “No.” He sounded pouty. “That’s the name I chose for myself. I’m preparing for my new identity. My new life.”

  Inwardly, I groaned. A wannabe. Even more pretentious than the real thing. “Am I to understand it, then, that you want to become a vampire?”

  “Of course. Someday. When I’m older.”

  It clicked then—the voice, the name, the utter cheese of it all. “Wait a minute—how old are you? You’re supposed to be eighteen to call in.” The kid had lied to my screener. Fifteen, I bet. And to his credit smart enough to know how much it would suck to get frozen at age fifteen for all eternity.

  “I’m ageless,” he said breathily. “Ageless as the grave.”

  “Okay, this is not the kinderbat poetry hour. You’ll want—oh, I don’t know—public access television for that.”

  The pause was ominous. Then, “Whoa, what a wicked cool idea.”

  Dear God, what have I done? Hurry, move on quick before I get into more trouble. “I don’t know what your question was, but you’re leaving now. Bye. Please, somebody with sense call me so we can discuss Byron or something. Next caller, hello.”

  “I knew him, you know.” This was a suave male voice, coolly assured. The real thing. An older vampire showing off his hard-earned ennui.

  “Knew who?”

  “Lord Byron, of course.”

  “Really,” I drawled. “You know, there are about as many vampires who say they knew Byron as there are reincarnatio
n freaks who say they were Cleopatra in a past life. Which would mean Byron had, like, hundreds of obnoxious simpering twits trailing after him. When he really only had Keats and Shelley.”

  The guy huffed. “How very droll.”

  “I’m sorry, you just hit one of my buttons, you know?”

  “You’ve never considered that perhaps one of those vampires who say they knew Byron might be right?”

  “Okay, fine. You chilled with Byron. You want to tell me what he was like? Him and the others? Hey, maybe you can answer a question for me—that other guy who was there the night they told the ghost stories and Mary Shelley came up with Frankenstein, the one whose name I can never remember—”

  “Polidori.”

  “Uh, yeah. Him.” Oh crap, what if this guy really had known Byron? Was I going to sound like a royal idiot? “I always wondered why he never amounted to anything.”

  “He was what we call a hanger-on. Mary was the really clever one.”

  I grinned. “I always thought so. Now, I don’t think you called just to talk about the Romantic poets. What’s on your mind?”

  “Destiny.”

  “Right, the big question. Like, why are we here, what’s the point to life, that sort of thing?”

  “I’m curious to hear what you think about it.”

  I pouted. “That’s my line.”

  “Are you going to tell me?”

  I sighed loudly to make sure the sound carried into the mike. “All right. I’ll bite. Here’s what I think, with the caveat that I may be wrong. I think we’re here to make the world a better place than we found it. I think we don’t always deserve the cards that we’re dealt, good or bad. But we are judged by how we play the cards we’re dealt. Those of us with a bum deal that makes it harder to do good—we just have to work a little more is all. There’s no destiny. There’s just muddling through without doing too much damage.”

  Most of the time I even believed that.

  “Hmm, that’s very nice,” the vampire said, coy and condescending.

  “All right. I know you’re just trying to bait me. Why don’t you come out and say what you want to say.”

  “You talk about us, vampires and lycanthropes, like we’re afflicted. Like we have a handicap. And if your goal is to pass as human, to blend in with society, then I suppose it is a handicap. But have you ever thought that we are the chosen ones? Fate marked us, and we became what we are. We are superior, chosen by destiny, and one day we will rule the world. The Families know this. They are grooming us, the masters of the night, to be the masters of everything. We’re the top of the food chain. One day humanity will see the truth of it.”