“They don’t cook,” she corrected. “Jure prefers his blood fresh.”
I could smell the blood. It saturated the air. The house, the grounds, and the entire ranch were soaked in blood and pain.
The back door was unlocked. Vaughn and I exchanged a look.
We crept through the immaculate designer kitchen and down a long hallway. I could smell vampire, but it wasn’t The Drainers’ scents. It didn’t reassure me that I was able to tell their terrible vampire smell from other, equally as terrible, but different vampire stenches.
We were walking into a trap. We all knew it. I turned to say something to Bobbie Jean, and that’s when our suspicions were confirmed.
“I’m sorry,” Bobbie Jean whispered, right before someone put a gun to my back.
We were led into a huge great room, which was decorated in southwest style with a dash of toxic masculinity.
Oh, wait, that was just Jure and his cronies.
“Someone had a free hand with taxidermy,” I said, staring at the stuffed heads of dead animals.
“I enjoy dead things.” Jure smirked at me from his leather chair, which was as big as his ego. In other words, ugly and oversize.
Clustered around him was a group of men holding glasses filled with blood.
I recognized a Chicago-based rapper, an A-list actor, a famous quarterback, a musician (not Travis—one who could actually sing), and another man who, although I didn’t recognize him, wore the unmistakable air of self-importance. And to round things off, the boys in the band stood awkwardly by the fireplace. It was weird to see the band without a couple of Bleeders hanging off them like human fast-food meals.
The men all wore expensive cologne, applied with a liberal hand—perhaps to mask the stench of vampire, but I could still detect it.
Travis made the rounds, handing out something small and silver. He was passing out demo tapes like it was 1995. Why had Bobbie Jean brought us here?
I scanned the room, but Skyler wasn’t there. In fact, there weren’t any girls in the room except for Bobbie Jean and me. I didn’t like where this was going.
The Chicago rapper held up his glass. “There’s nothing more refreshing than the blood of a young girl.”
He would be the one I killed first. As soon as I figured out exactly how to kill a vampire. It had been nothing but luck both times I’d managed it. Luck and my trusty drumstick.
Travis glared at me. “What’s she doing here?”
The guys in the band looked over at me. “What’s the problem? She’s cute.”
“Cute?” Travis said. “She’s the reason we needed a new drummer.” Then he looked over at Vaughn. “Why is our temporary drummer here? This is a vampire-only party.”
Jure scowled. “You let the witch’s consort in your band?”
“What?” Travis replied. “He’s good with the sticks.”
Jure didn’t even look at Travis when he backhanded him.
“Is Skyler actually here?” I asked Bobbie Jean. “Or did you lie about everything just to get us here?”
She didn’t answer me, but Jure said, “My son’s little friend is currently my guest.”
“Let her go, Jure,” I said, but he didn’t even flinch. My command voice bounced right off him.
He smirked at me. “That only works on young fools like my son.”
He motioned to someone sitting in a little alcove. “Get their rooms ready.” An older woman in a severe black uniform stood and then left the room. From my brief glance, I couldn’t tell if she was a vampire or human, but I thought she was human.
His stare forced me to look up, but I remembered to focus on something over his shoulder and avoided his direct gaze. I was astonished by the sheer rage coming off him in waves. One wrong word, and he’d snap my bones and rip out my heart to serve it in a stew.
I’d never had anyone hate me like this. Terror made it hard for me to think.
I wasn’t sure if he hated me because I was a Mariotti witch or simply because I was female.
“Don’t look in their eyes,” I whispered to Vaughn, but Jure heard me. He let out a laugh that sounded like it had been kept in a vault and only taken out for special occasions.
“That might work with my pathetically weak progeny, but I’ll bend you to my will as quickly as you bend a straw.”
Arguing with him would only sap my strength, so I tried ignoring him.
“Take off your necklace.”
My hand raised against my own volition, but I managed to stop it with enough concentration. “No,” I said. “If you want it, come and take it from me.”
“You won’t be so disrespectful soon,” he managed, but he looked shaken. He recovered quickly and snapped his fingers at The Drainers’ piano player.
“She’s wearing a necklace,” he told him. “Take it off her. She’ll be more…compliant without it.”
Armando approached me slowly. “I don’t suppose you’d take it off for me?” he asked.
“Must have flunked Vampire 101,” Bobbie Jean muttered. “Vampires don’t ask; they tell. That’s why Jure’s so pissed at you. You resisted his compulsion.”
Interesting. I turned my attention to Armando, who was still watching me hopefully.
I shook my head. His hand inched closer to my neck, where the chain showed. I snapped my teeth at him, and he jumped.
“Remember Fang?” I asked him.
“Fang’s dead,” Armando said.
“Yeah, I know,” I replied meaningfully. “I killed him.”
Now if I could only figure out how I’d done it and repeat the effort.
He studied me for a second and then shook his head. “Anything you could do to me, Jure would do worse.”
He wrapped his hand around the chain and started to yank but let go almost immediately when his skin started sizzling. The smell of burned vampire flesh filled the air.
The guy howled with pain while I gagged from the odor. Still, I smirked at him as he writhed on the floor.
“Leave it for now,” Jure said. I noticed he didn’t try to take my necklace. He smiled at Vaughn. “We have other ways of making Ms. Mariotti cooperate.”
That asshole.
“You’ve done well, Bobbie Jean,” Jure said.
Bobbie Jean squared her jaw. “I brought her here like you asked,” she said, confirming she’d double-crossed us. “Now give me my sister.”
“You’ll be reunited with the girl soon enough,” Jure said. His eyes gleamed, and I realized he was getting a sick pleasure from playing with her. If it were up to him, Bobbie Jean and her sister wouldn’t be leaving here.
At least not alive.
Bobbie Jean seemed to realize the same thing. She took a swing at him, but Jure’s body moved at an incredible speed, and when he stopped again, he was on the other side of the room.
I’d been so naive—too worried about Sky to worry about myself. Or Vaughn.
“Please show our guests to their accommodations,” Jure said blandly, like we’d been invited for a sleepover. His lips were wet with blood from his goblet.
I held out a cross, which Edna had given me before I left, and Jure laughed in my face. “I’m afraid we’ve built up quite a tolerance to the more traditional vampire repellents,” he said. “We have coexisted with humans for hundreds of years.”
That probably meant holy water wouldn’t work, either, and I’d read that the strongest ones could even walk in daylight, as long as they avoided direct sun.
The housekeeper returned, stone-faced. “The rooms are ready, sir.”
“Thank you, Hilda,” he replied. “My friends would enjoy a little playtime, I think.” The other vampires laughed, which sent a shudder down my back. I didn’t think we had the same idea of “playtime.”
She nodded once and left the room. The guy holding a gun at my
back prodded me with it until I followed her.
They took Bobbie Jean and Vaughn somewhere else and then led me upstairs to a bedroom and shoved me inside. Now that I was here, “room” wasn’t exactly the right description. Holding cell? Prison?
There were bars on the window, and after the door slammed, I heard the distinct click of a lock from the outside.
Bobbie Jean could rot after betraying us, but I would find Vaughn and Skyler and get us out of here. I wished I knew how I’d managed to kill vampires before, but it had just happened. I hadn’t even meant to do it. But now, when I really, really wanted to kill one, my powers had deserted me.
I still had my trusty drumstick. I hoped that would be enough.
Chapter Twenty-Four
I was in a high-end bedroom. It looked like something a ten-year-old girl might like. There was a white canopy bed piled high with a frilly white comforter set and pillows. A painting of a little girl with enormous eyes hung above the bed. Her solemn gaze made me walk away, out of the direct line of her fixed gaze, but I still felt like she was watching me. The room was big enough to contain a fireplace—unlit—and a small table and chairs.
Strangely, there were plenty of snacks on the table. My stomach growled, and I reached for a piece of red licorice.
“It makes the blood taste sweeter.” The voice was low, rusty, but with a hint of a Southern accent. “They love it. I’d rather starve.”
I hadn’t noticed her. She was thin to the point of emaciation and had light-brown hair instead of Bobbie Jean’s platinum blond, but I could tell immediately that this was her sister. She had the same-shaped eyes and soft accent. She looked out the bay window, sitting on the window seat, staring at nothing.
“Who loves it?” I asked, but I already knew the answer.
She ignored my question. “They’ll come for us soon,” she said.
“I’m Tansy,” I replied. “What’s your name?”
“Opal Ann,” she whispered.
“How old are you, Opal Ann?”
“I’m sixteen.” She paused. “Unless I had a birthday since I’ve been here. I’ve kind of lost track of time.”
Sixteen? She’s still so young. No wonder Bobbie Jean was willing to betray us.
“Are you Bobbie Jean’s sister?”
She nodded once.
“She’s looking for you.” I didn’t feel any satisfaction that Jure had double-crossed Bobbie Jean after she’d double-crossed us. After getting a closer look at the girl, I’d do whatever it took to get her out, too.
There were thick bars on the window. Opal Ann was back to gazing out of it.
“What are you looking at?” I asked.
“If I sit just right, I can see the ocean.”
She was basically one big bruise. Her hair was matted, and she gave off a distinct odor.
“How long have you been here?” I asked.
She shrugged. “I think about six months.”
I gasped and couldn’t mask the horrified look on my face.
“It wasn’t all bad,” she said. “If Jure was in a good mood, sometimes he’d take me to a party.”
“A party?” I asked, shocked by the idea that people had seen Jure with a teenager and hadn’t done anything.
“Sure,” she said. “Sometimes, there were good things to eat.” But then her smile fell.
“People saw you? With bruises like those? Did they try to help?”
She shook her head.
“I’m going to help you,” I said. “You’ll see Bobbie Jean soon. I promise.”
“Bobbie Jean is here?” She looked like she was about to cry. “I told her to go home and forget about me.”
“She didn’t.”
Opal Ann closed her eyes briefly. “They’ll never let us go.”
There were no clocks in the room, and my phone was nearly dead, so I’d powered it off. But it felt like they left us there for a long time.
“Any minute now,” she said dully.
Footsteps sounded loud in the silence. I tried to drag the bureau in front of the door, but it was bolted down. All the furniture was secured to the floor.
“Hurry, tell me something. Anything that you think might help,” I urged.
“There’s nothing,” she said. “You can’t fight him. Jure’s too powerful.” The hopeless tone nearly wrecked me, but then she said, “Except…”
“Except?”
“Except,” she said again, her lips turning up so slightly that it barely qualified as a smile, “I know how to kill vampires.”
The footsteps were closer now.
“This one girl, Sarah… She’s gone now,” Opal Ann said. “She got all funny toward the end. Started chugging Diet Dr Pepper. She’d down a couple of those liter bottles before lunch. And Jure had a party…”
“What happens at these parties?”
“They leave just enough blood in you. Just enough. But when they’re done with you, you wish you were dead.”
I wanted to purge the picture she’d painted from my mind, but I couldn’t. “What happened with Sarah?”
“When this disgusting old vampire drank her blood, it killed him.” Her eyes gleamed with satisfaction. “He had a bad reaction to the soda, I guess. After that, they were dragging her off, but she managed to grab a liter of the stuff and throw it at one of the vampires. His face bubbled up like she’d thrown acid on him. That’s the last time I ever saw her.”
“Seriously?” I couldn’t believe it. “Crosses, holy water, none of that stuff works, but it’s as easy as soda?”
“It worked,” Opal Ann said.
The undead were vulnerable to soda. That explained why The Drainers had banned it from all their shows.
The door opened, and a guy in Wrangler jeans and a T-shirt came in and grabbed Opal Ann by the arm. He was in his mid-twenties, just a few inches taller than me, and prematurely balding with a droopy mustache and eyes to match.
“Let go of her,” I said, trying to use my power. “I command you.”
He let out a short laugh. “That magic stuff won’t work with me.” He started to drag Opal Ann out.
“Why are you doing this?” I asked.
“Jure lets me have his seconds,” he said.
Opal Ann’s face went white, and I could see her shoulders shaking. “Don’t bite me again,” she whimpered.
Rage started as a ripple in my belly or maybe a little lower, like period cramps. Then the ripples spread throughout my body, but still, my power didn’t come.
If my witch side wasn’t working, maybe my vampire side would do the trick. I let my fangs descend and my nails turn into long golden claws.
“Let her go,” I said.
He smirked at me. “There’s enough of me to go around.” He held Opal Ann tight but made a grab for me.
I jumped away from him, and when I looked again, he had a long, pointy knife in his hands. “It’s my pig sticker,” he said, laughing when he saw my face. He swiped at me, and I felt a burn in my upper arm.
He’d cut me.
I went woozy at the sight of my own blood but took a deep breath. I couldn’t faint.
I remembered Granny’s advice to “aim for the squishy parts” and rammed my fist into his Adam’s apple. He let go of Opal Ann.
“You are going to regret that,” I said.
Then I reached out and used my hard, pointed fingernail to rake a line across his throat. I was hoping to cut his carotid artery. Blood sprayed from his neck, and I had to resist the urge to vomit as he tumbled to the floor.
“How many people knew you were kept here?” I asked Opal Ann.
“A lot. Vampires. Humans too. The humans mostly looked the other way.”
“Let’s go,” I said.
“Is he dead?” she asked.
I shrugged. “I
don’t know, but we need to get out of here.”
She nodded and then kicked him in the crotch as she went by.
I liked this girl.
We started toward the door, but then she went back and yanked something off his belt.
She jingled a set of keys in her hands. “Now we can go.”
I really liked this girl.
“Great idea,” I said with a smile.
“Follow me,” she said.
As we crept along the hallway, I asked her, “Where would they have taken my friend Vaughn? He was with Bobbie Jean when they brought me to your room.”
“We don’t get many guys here,” Opal Ann said, avoiding my eyes.
I tiptoed to the head of the stairs, but I didn’t hear anything.
“I think they’re still having drinks,” Opal Ann said. “Dinner’s usually not until nine.”
Dinner. It’s people.
To the world, they were famous and influential men, but to the girls upstairs, they were dangerous predators.
“If you did happen to get a male ‘guest,’ where would they put him?”
Opal’s face went blank. “Nowhere good.”
Damn it. I needed to find Vaughn and Skyler and get out of here. We’d escaped Jure once, but I didn’t want to take any chances.
“He might be in Mr. Small’s room,” she finally said.
“The actor from that historical drama?” I was astonished.
“You don’t believe that a vampire can be an actor because of the reflection thing?” Opal Ann asked. “The mirror thing is true, but they do show up on film.”
I’d seen enough of the band’s photos/videos/Instagram posts to know that. I didn’t have time to ask if this actor guy could walk in daylight, but I really wanted to know. Otherwise, wouldn’t auditions be a pain?
“Do you know which room is his?” The place was huge.
Opal Ann shook her head. “But I know he liked the third floor.”
We made a detour to the kitchen to look for diet soda. The refrigerator was empty except for a can of beer and a bottle of vodka.
“Jure must have gotten rid of it,” she said. “And the vodka’s for Marisol. She gets a little uncooperative if they don’t sedate her first.”
The Afterlife of the Party Page 19