Kiefer nodded, grimacing. “I need to fine-tune that spell. It was only supposed to last for a couple of hours. Anyway, right after I hung up with you, I went home and mixed up the elixir you asked for. Then I came back here to wait for the call you said I’d be getting. The stuff you’d said about vampires possibly being on the prowl in Vintage Meadow Lake had me kinda wigged out, though, and I got to thinking about our old pal, Celia. So I checked the surveillance cams on her latest resting place, and what d’you think I saw? That nice, smooth patch of dirt where we’ve been keeping her all these years? Wasn’t so nice and smooth anymore. Now it’s just a big ol’ empty crater. I’d show you the footage but…” he waved at the mess cluttering the floor. “They sort of demolished all my computers. Anyway, once I was done soiling myself, I was about to call you, Nathan, when, bam, the two Snacks just sauntered through my hidden door like they owned the place. They trashed the joint and started working me over. Caught me by surprise, I’ll tell ya what.”
“How did they get in?” Nathan asked. “The front door was locked when we arrived. And the wall panel was still in place in front of your office entrance.”
“Yeah, I don’t know,” Kiefer said, but a guilty look had stolen over his face.
Nathan’s brows lowered. “You did not set the alarm, did you? How many times have I told you—”
“To set the stupid alarm when I’m here by myself, yeah, yeah, I know,” Kiefer grumbled, holding up his hands. “Well, lesson learned, alright? Anyway, I guess they must’ve picked the lock and then brought down my ward somehow. They probably used a spell to lock the doors again when they left, maybe hoping nobody would notice anything weird.”
“I am sorry,” Nathan said, looking contrite again. “This is my fault.”
Kiefer shrugged. “Eh. Celia was pretty pissed when we buried her. We always knew it was a possibility she’d come back and try to kill us for it. A pretty unlikely possibility, but still…”
“Someone had to have helped her escape,” Nathan said. “Who would do such a thing?”
“I shudder to think. Maybe one of her get? Finding out who’s responsible should probably be our next order of business, though.” Kiefer’s gaze went to the trio of women standing over them. “After we help your friends, here, that is.” He held a hand out to Nathan, who helped him to his feet. “Hello, ladies,” he said, dusting his jeans and straightening his t-shirt, “how y’all doing?”
Lucy and Dara murmured bashful responses, offering him their names. Jessica stuck out her hand and stepped forward. “Hi. I’m Jessica Ramos.”
Kiefer grinned at her, revealing a charming dimple in his blood-streaked face. “Hey, there,” he said, pumping her hand. “Name’s Grant Clayton. At your service.”
“Clayton?” Jessica’s brow wrinkled. “But I thought your name was Kiefer?”
“You can call me that if you want. Lots of folks do. But it’s not my real name, just a handle I use online, when I’m researching vampire stuff.”
Jessica’s eyes lit up. “Is it because of Kiefer Sutherland? Because of The Lost Boys?”
Kiefer said, “No, although other people have thought that, too. I’m actually just a big Rolling Stones fan. You know, Keef Richards…Keef Fan…People started calling me Keefer and I started spelling it with an ‘I’…it’s just sort of morphed over the years, the way these things tend to do.”
Now Jessica’s eyes were practically twinkling. “I love the Rolling Stones!” she gushed. “I have a tongue logo tattoo!”
One of Kiefer’s eyebrows went up, his expression sharpening to one of keen interest. “That so?” He looked her up and down. “And whereabouts might that be located?”
Jessica chuckled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”
“Well, I’ll tell you this much,” he said, the crooked grin never leaving his mouth, “I certainly wouldn’t turn down the chance to find out.”
Jessica gasped, but his comments had clearly delighted her. Spots of color arose on her cheeks, and she pointed at him with a teasing grin. “You,” she said, “are trouble!”
“I have heard that once or twice in my life before,” he drawled.
“Yeah, I’ll bet.” She sidled closer to him.
Kiefer sauntered in closer to her, too, his mouth opening to say something else.
“Ahem,” Nathan cleared his throat, coughing into his fist.
Kiefer took a step back. He turned to Nathan with a sheepish smile and held up his hands again. “Oh, sorry, man, I wasn’t trying to move in on your Kool-Aid or anything. Sometimes I just forget to, you know, turn it off.”
Jessica’s eyebrows shot up. “I’m not anyone’s Kool-aid,” she said. Then, glancing at Nathan hopefully, “Am I?”
The vampire seemed at a loss, opening and closing his mouth without saying anything.
Dara elbowed Lucy and said, “Look. We just learned another fact about vampires. Apparently, they can blush. A lot.”
Lucy looked at Nathan, who had indeed turned an impressive shade of coral. But now his eyes blazed, and his lips curled back. He bared his fangs at the women, making a horrible hissing noise from the back of his throat.
“Ahhh!” They squealed and jumped away from him.
Nathan closed his mouth with a snap, glaring at them.
“Was that really necessary?” Jessica demanded, clutching at her heart.
“I obviously needed to remind you all of how serious this situation is,” Nathan groused, and Lucy noticed he was avoiding Jessica’s eyes. “Now. Ladies. I know that you have all read many books and seen numerous films featuring them, but real-life vampires bear scarce resemblance to what you may have gleaned about them from fiction. These beings are monstrous, far deadlier than they are often portrayed, and if your friends have been turned into them, then we do not have any time to waste by standing around lollygagging.” He looked from Lucy to Dara and barked, “You two. Report to me how your men have been faring of late.”
“Um,” Dara swallowed and shot a glance at Lucy. “They both seem to have gotten over the flu-like symptoms they were having.”
“Y-yeah,” Lucy said. “Now they’re both just sleeping a lot.”
Nathan looked concerned. “We must move quickly, then. Kiefer, you said you’d mixed up the elixir I’d asked you to prepare, just in case?”
“Just in case of what?” Jessica asked.
“In case you were telling the truth,” Kiefer answered, “and your friends really had been bitten and turned by a vampire.”
Jessica turned an insulted look on Nathan. “You really didn’t believe me?”
“Vampires are extremely rare creatures,” he said, “and masters, capable of turning people, even more so.”
“Yeah, but you knew you had a master buried practically in your own backyard!”
Nathan looked chagrined. “I did not believe Celia could have been responsible for what you reported. I…I suppose I was too arrogant to think she might have escaped Kiefer and myself.” He paused, looking into Jessica’s eyes. “I regret that. Please accept my apology.”
Jessica frowned, but she only contemplated him for a second before her eyes went soft and her irritation seemed to melt away. Her mouth pulled to one side, and she flapped her hand. “Oh, it’s okay. I guess it was a pretty weird story. Thanks for ordering the elixir for us anyway.”
“Yeah, about that.” Kiefer stepped over the rubble of his office to reach a toppled cabinet. “I did mix it up for you ladies, but the Snacks smashed the bottles when they showed up. They smashed everything in here.” He pointed to the sticky, luminescent substances spilled all around the cabinet, smeared amid shards of broken glass and crumbled cork stoppers.
“Can you make more?” Nathan asked him.
“I left some of it at home. It’s not far, as you know. I can go get it and meet you guys wherever you’re headed next.”
“We should go back to Dara’s place,” Jessica said. “Based on what we know, we think her husband, Jason, was bitten befor
e Aaron was, which means we should probably give him the medicine first, right?”
“Very well,” Nathan agreed, and started herding them all toward the doorway, “one of you give Kiefer the address and we will be on our way.”
“Um, Nathan?” Kiefer paused, patting at his crusty hair. “I know this is an emergency and all, but is it okay with you if I take a few minutes at home to wash some of this blood off me-?”
“By all means,” Nathan nodded at him. “Just hurry.”
Chapter Eleven
“What’s a Snack?” Lucy asked Nathan, once they were back on the road, heading to the Donovans’ apartment. She had twisted to the side so she could face the vampire through the gap between the front seats of Dara’s SUV. One hand clutched at the seat, and she peeped at him over her knuckles.
“A human who allows a vampire to feed off them whenever they like, and who performs their bidding,” Nathan said with distaste. “Your basic pathetic lackey.”
“Do all vampires have those?” Lucy wondered. “The bad ones, I mean. Not you, obviously.”
Nathan smiled briefly. “I honestly do not know. But many people on the internet have reported such arrangements, so I suppose it is at least common.” Seeing Lucy’s look of confusion, he explained, “Between us, Kiefer and I have only ever interacted with three other vampires, including Celia. Much of what we ‘know’ about the species, we have gleaned from old texts we have tracked down, and from the internet, by conferring with others who claim to have, collectively, hunted far more of these creatures than we have.”
Lucy watched him by the light of the streetlamps as he spoke, noting the tension in his handsome face. “You don’t like talking about this,” she realized.
“No,” he admitted, “not at all. But I understand you have questions. I will tell you as much as I can.” He punctuated this with another small smile which, although strained, seemed genuine.
Lucy smiled back and adjusted her glasses. “How long have you been a vampire?” she asked.
“Forty-two years.”
“That’s not very long,” Jessica interjected with obvious surprise.
“It seems like a long time to me,” Nathan told her, but with a rough laugh.
“Forty-two years and you’ve only ever run into three other vampires?” Dara asked, cruising to a stop at a red light.
“I have only ever run into two,” Nathan corrected her. “First the master who made me, and then many years later, Celia. The third vampire to which I referred was Kiefer’s kill, which he accomplished prior to meeting me. It took him several years, but he tracked down and destroyed his own master.”
“His own master?” Lucy’s pulse picked up speed. “You mean…”
“He used to be a vampire,” Dara said cautiously.
“But he isn’t anymore,” Jessica finished, sounding excited.
“Correct,” Nathan said. “He is very much human once again, as you all just witnessed.”
Lucy’s heart leapt at this revelation and, judging from the eager look on Dara’s face, she was just as happy to hear it.
“So it really can be done!” Lucy was ecstatic. “If we kill the thing that bit Aaron and Jason, they’ll be normal again! Um, no offense, Nathan.”
Nathan said, “None taken. Believe me, if I could change back and be ‘normal,’ too, I would.”
“But,” Jessica said to him, “you do seem normal. You’re not running around attacking people, like this Celia character. Are there different kinds of vampires or something?”
Nathan thought for a moment. He said, “While I cannot tell you for certain why some vampires are feral and others are not, there is a popular theory that attempts to explain it. Some hunters believe all masters are descended from one of two original vampire families, both related to one another, and both now long extinct. The masters—like Celia—are their ‘first generation,’ so to speak. And while all masters are generally mad as a function of their great age, the vampires they produce are influenced by the blood of their ancestors. The descendants of one original family tend to be rational, while the descendants of the other tend to be feral. If this is true, it could mean that my maker originated from the more rational branch of the family tree, and that this is why I am not prone to aggression or violence. Personally, I feel this is just wishful thinking. It is preposterous to me, the idea that there has ever been such a thing as a ‘good’ vampire. Almost every hunter’s report I have ever seen, has told of an encounter with a rabid nosferatu or an evil master. Which leads me to believe there are only those vampires who are bad and…those of us who have, for whatever reason, yet to become so.”
“In other words, we’re not wrong for wanting to change our guys back,” Dara interpreted.
“You are not wrong in the least,” Nathan concurred. “Even if your men were to retain their faculties forever after the change, I still would not wish this life on them. Or on anyone. It is a blighted existence.” Seeing the anxious look on Lucy’s face, he picked up his earlier thread. “Anyway, yes, Lucy, in theory, killing the master should break the curse. But I think it is important you know it may not work, either. As with everything else concerning vampires, Kiefer and I have both heard many conflicting reports regarding this ‘cure.’ It is possible it only works with some vampires and not others, or only during specific time windows. We cannot be certain.”
Lucy nodded, but she wasn’t about to let go of hope that easily. She would believe the cure would work until she saw with her own eyes that it didn’t. She couldn’t allow herself to entertain any other possibility. Not if she didn’t want to disintegrate into a blubbering mess.
Meanwhile, Jessica was gazing at Nathan with amusement, her lips tipped up at each corner. “So, you were first young back in the seventies? Does that mean you used to run around in bell-bottoms?”
An abrupt laugh broke from the vampire. “Please,” he said, “flare-legged trousers, perhaps. And do not judge me; everyone wore them.”
The women laughed.
“If you were turned in the seventies,” Dara said, smiling at him in the rearview mirror, “why do you sound like you’re from the eighteen-hundreds?”
“Or maybe the future,” Lucy added without thinking. “Like an android or something.”
“Lucy!” Jessica gasped, her mouth dropping open.
Uh-oh. Lucy knew she must’ve really stepped in it if Jessica was offended. She felt her face heat up, and she looked at Nathan with a sheepish smile. “Sorry. I didn’t mean it in a bad way. Androids are, um...They’re pretty awesome.”
Another laugh escaped Nathan’s throat, and it was tinged with surprise, like he could hardly believe these were the questions these humans had decided to ask him. “Kiefer theorizes that my maker was quite old,” he said, “and that I somehow ‘inherited’ her speech patterns when she turned me. When I am in mixed company, I make an effort to use contractions, but I often forget. I know it is strange. Some have even said…a bit off-putting.”
“Well, it isn’t,” Jessica said, her eyes locked on his face. “I like it. It makes you sound genteel. Like you should be wearing a tailcoat and a cravat and riding a stallion across the heath in some Merchant Ivory movie.” A dreamy sigh escaped her, and she added, “Or a romance novel.”
Lucy watched Nathan scratch his jaw self-consciously, and she suspected that if the interior of the vehicle had been brighter, she’d have seen him blush again.
“How come I can see your reflection in the mirror?” Dara asked, watching him in the rearview again.
“Only masters can hide their reflections,” he replied, “and only if they wish to.”
“Can you eat?” Lucy asked. “Regular food, I mean? Jessica already told us you don’t drink people-blood.”
“Yes, I can eat in small quantities. But it is…unpleasant. I can, however, drink plain water without any trouble. In fact, I must drink quite a lot of it, or I become uncomfortable.”
“Can you turn into a bat?” Dara asked. “Or a w
olf or anything?”
“No, I cannot transform into anything.”
“Are you allergic to garlic?”
“No,” he laughed.
“Do you sleep in a coffin?”
“I sleep in a bed,” he replied. “A king size bed surrounded by heavy curtains, and with a Memory Foam mattress and organic cotton sheets. It is extraordinarily comfortable.”
“Oh,” Lucy raised her eyebrows, “I see. That does sound extraordinarily comfortable. But why were you staring at Jessica the whole time you were describing it just now?”
“What? I was not,” Nathan said, even though he totally had been. “I mean, I…well...”
Lucy chuckled, and Jessica leaned forward, pressing a finger to Lucy’s forehead. “Please pay no attention to our class clown,” she said to Nathan. “I think the excitement might be getting to her.” She widened her eyes at Lucy and tipped her back into the front seat. She sat back and crossed her legs and, with a syrupy smile, batted her eyelashes at Nathan and changed the subject. “So…tell me how you have such an incredible tan, Nathan? I thought vampires were supposed to be practically translucent.”
Nathan, looking amused, ran his fingers through his thick hair. “This is what I have always looked like. A hint of Greek and Italian ancestry making itself known, I suppose. It seems vampirism preserves almost everything about a person’s appearance at the time of their turning, although I do have to trim my hair and shave from time to time.”
Lucy opened her mouth to needle the vampire some more—and to try and make him blush again, since apparently it was so easy to do, particularly where Jessica was concerned—but then Dara poked her leg and distracted her. “I feel like we should be writing all this down,” she said. “101 Vampire Facts.”
“Kiefer has beaten you to it,” Nathan informed her. “He has established an online catalogue for vampiric data. A few other reliable hunters have access to it as well, so that they may submit their knowledge to the pages as it suits them.”
“A vampire hunters’ wiki?” Lucy asked, sharing a grin with Dara. Lucy looked at Nathan again, preparing to ask him if other supernatural creatures existed. Were there werewolves running around out there, too? Ghosts? Demons? But Jessica had recaptured his attention with a more personal question.
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