Déjà Vu
By Addison Albright
Published by JMS Books LLC
Visit jms-books.com for more information.
Copyright 2018 Addison Albright
ISBN 9781634868167
Cover Design: Written Ink Designs | written-ink.com
Image(s) used under a Standard Royalty-Free License.
All rights reserved.
WARNING: This book is not transferable. It is for your own personal use. If it is sold, shared, or given away, it is an infringement of the copyright of this work and violators will be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.
No portion of this book may be transmitted or reproduced in any form, or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, with the exception of brief excerpts used for the purposes of review.
This book is for ADULT AUDIENCES ONLY. It may contain sexually explicit scenes and graphic language which might be considered offensive by some readers. Please store your files where they cannot be accessed by minors.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are solely the product of the author’s imagination and/or are used fictitiously, though reference may be made to actual historical events or existing locations. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Published in the United States of America.
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Thank you to my regular critique partners and beta readers for your invaluable advice: Amy, Jena, Leslie, Nell, and Spencer.
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Déjà Vu
By Addison Albright
Chapter 1: To Walk or Not to Walk?
Chapter 2: Déjà Vu
Chapter 3: Merry Christmas to All!
Chapter 1: To Walk or Not to Walk?
Gavin
Gavin and Matthew pushed through the theater’s outer doors into the chilly night along with the rest of the holiday revelers. Matthew made that purring hum that landed somewhere between a sigh and a soft laugh on the scale of sounds Gavin used to read his husband’s moods. That particular noise meant Matthew was contented.
They’d come out to watch the cinema’s annual double feature of It’s a Wonderful Life and A Christmas Story. Personally, Gavin would rather have watched Bad Santa, but the sappy movies were well worth sitting through, because Matthew was so easygoing and never complained when they went with Gavin’s preferences. Besides, a contented Matthew invariably morphed into a cuddly Matthew. And that was never a bad thing.
Gavin stepped nimbly, warmed despite the brisk, fresh air. He pulled in a deep lungful. The mostly full moon lay hidden behind a sky full of clouds. None but the brightest stars would have been discernable anyway due to the ambient big-city lights.
A light snow was falling. Granny would have called it “Christmas snow,” large, wet flakes drifting gently from the clouds high above. The kind that made one want to turn their face to the sky and open their mouth to catch a flake or two on their tongue. “Snowman snow,” if enough of the stuff fell to the ground. Scattered flakes adorned Matthew’s chin-length, floppy brown hair and short, tidy beard like he’d had glitter tossed on him.
No doubt snowflakes landed on his own head, but Gavin figured they probably looked more like dandruff on his short, wavy, black hair.
“Let’s walk home.” Matthew clasped Gavin’s hand and flashed his eyebrows.
“I don’t know.” Gavin gave that hand—warm even through their gloves—a firm squeeze. “It’s pretty late.” Although, a growing number of people were hailing taxis, so most likely he and Matthew would be waiting a while if they held out for one.
“It’ll be fine.” The light from the streetlamp reflected off Matthew’s dark chocolate-brown eyes, making them shine, and Gavin’s heart melt. “I don’t want to risk a stinky cab messing up the beauty of this night.”
Getting mugged on the walk home would screw it up even more, but Gavin glanced down the street. With plenty of people still out and about, that outcome was unlikely, and he kept that pessimistic thought to himself. He needed to stop letting his military background affect everyday decisions here in the real world.
“Okay.” Gavin lifted Matthew’s gloved hand to his lips for a brief kiss. Matthew’s eyes glimmered merrily from the twinkling lights around the movie posters they passed. Romantic gestures like that always brought a smile to Matthews’s lips, and Gavin loved nothing better than to make the love of his life smile.
The thud of their steady steps, sounding heavy with their solid thick-soled boots, blended with the general background clamor of footsteps and cars buzzing by. None stood out until they’d traveled several blocks, and the traffic—both foot and vehicular—thinned.
Even then, none of the noises stood out as exceptional or disquieting in any way, only now Gavin could distinguish the individual sounds. He listened out of habit rather than because he felt any undue concern.
Matthew’s movements remained buoyant even with the solidity of his strides. A pair of footsteps behind them took a right turn, and others replaced them, merging from a side street to join the handful of others still there.
Halfway home, foot traffic dropped to a trickle, and a streetlamp ahead of them winked out. The alley behind it lay pitch black.
Likely, the timing was coincidental. Lights went out, and odds were someone would be around to see it when it happened. Just because Gavin and Matthew were the people to see this one shine its last lumen didn’t mean there was anything nefarious about the timing.
Nonetheless, no sense in inviting trouble when there were easy options to avoid it. Gavin slowed and checked over his shoulder to make sure the street was clear, then steered Matthew across the expanse of pavement. They would pass an alley on that side, too, but the streetlamp at its end shone brightly, and nothing—or rather nobody—was visible from their vantage point.
“You know—” Matthew sounded droll “—if somebody with the ability to turn off a single streetlamp at will is after us, they’re going to get us eventually anyway.”
Gavin wasn’t that paranoid. Nobody was after them in particular. Why would they be? Well, gay-bashers might single them out, but not to the point of planning ahead and lying in wait. It was possible someone with that kind of technology might target random passersby, though. Most likely it was a legit blown light, but even then, someone who happened to be lurking in the alley might take advantage of it.
“I know. Just humor me, darling.”
Better safe than sorry, that was Gavin’s motto. But when that second light went dark just as they passed under it, Gavin realized it was possible to be both—doing the seemingly safe thing, but still ending up sorry.
In the fraction of a second that he had to consider their situation, the thought that he hadn’t been paranoid enough passed through his mind. But surely the idea that someone could and would turn off one streetlamp to lure them across the street before turning off the second flirted with the edges of extreme conspiracy theories. Didn’t it?
Gavin gasped when the first light, now across the wide street, came back on, doing them only a little good at this distance. But further noise caught in his throat as Matthew was ripped away from him. Or rather, Gavin’s scream choked at his larynx, because a hand, far stronger than it should be, wrapped around his neck, squeezing relentlessly.
Someone yanked him effortlessly into the inky blackness of the alley. Something clattered against a Dumpster—sounds consistent with a man kicking, struggling for his life—much like Gavin was thrashing his legs, only without finding any purchase.
No vocalizations came from any of the alley’s occupants. Matthew was probably being held the same way as Gavin.
Gavin’s eyes widened as he struggled to see something, anything, that coul
d be used to help. His arms flailed, hitting nothing. He had to get free…had to help Matthew. He couldn’t let his husband die like this, terrified and alone.
Matthew must have been hauled away from that Dumpster. The clanging stopped, replaced by erratic thumps of his boots on the hard surface pavement. Until it stopped, the same instant a viscous liquid, unnaturally warm in the cold winter air, spurted across Gavin’s face.
“Nooooo!” Gavin’s mind screamed the word unable to escape him, no matter how much he wanted to drown out the slurping sounds coming from that same direction.
He kicked out helplessly as a mouth with dagger-sharp and astonishingly long teeth opened in front of him. The faint glow of the distant streetlight reflected off those brilliantly white fangs…and the very human-looking eyes above them.
All Gavin could think was that Matthew was gone. He’d failed his love, the man who made life worth living. He’d fallen into the trap that these—vampires?—had set, and Matthew was dead, or about to be, because Gavin could do absolutely nothing to prevent it.
A chill that went far beyond the December night air penetrated to his bones. No tears ran down his cheeks. He was too dead inside to feel anymore. He didn’t flatter himself with the thought they’d been specifically targeted. No. They’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
Gavin went limp as the fangs descended toward his neck. He didn’t even care.
* * * *
Victor
“What on Earth?”
Victor jumped at the unexpected words, not to mention the shocked tone embedded in them. He hadn’t heard Bryan approach. “Nothing.” Victor sat straighter and managed to say the single word without adding a questioning inflection, but it still sounded guilty. As hell.
“You can’t do that!” Bryan continued to read over his shoulder. “Can you? Seriously, you’re not going to kill off Gavin and Matthew, are you? I mean, that’s your most popular series.”
Victor sighed and shrugged but didn’t give a verbal reply.
Bryan squatted, then peered up at him with narrowed eyes. “It’s a romance, for goodness’ sake. Can you really just throw in a vampire death scene five books into a contemporary romance series? You’re not going to turn them into killer vampires, are you?”
A clatter of falling—something—came from the living room.
Bryan’s head turned toward the sound. “Shit,” he muttered, then glanced at Victor and groaned as he stood. “Felix must be climbing the tree again. Hold that thought. I mean, they’re your characters, you can do what you want, or what your publisher will let you do, I guess, but do you really want to do this to your readers? Even if you want to end the series, is this the best way to do it?”
“Probably not,” Victor muttered. Although thoroughly sick of writing the pair of characters, he recognized that he’d been only letting off steam as his fingers had flown across the keyboard typing. He glanced at his watch and followed meekly as Bryan rushed to the living room.
“I wonder which ornament bit the dust this time?” Bryan faced Victor. The concern lines on his forehead smoothed, and one side of his mouth twitched. Funny that the destruction of an ornament rated less concern than Victor killing off fictional characters.
“Dunno.” Because no ornament was safe from their kitten, Felix, no matter the placement. Victor shuddered as a long-ago vision of a Christmas tree falling on his young self filtered to the surface. Hopefully, the kitten would outgrow the burning need to explore the tree, same as he had done.
Bryan stooped to pick up the broken pieces of a basic metallic ball. “You know those interlocking foam floor tiles they make for kids’ rooms? We should get some to put under the tree. Nothing has a chance when it hits this granite flooring.”
“Good idea.” Victor gently pried Felix from where he’d hunkered down about two-thirds up the tree. When Bryan turned questioning eyes that carried a hint of sadness toward him, Victor put on what he hoped was a reassuring smile. “I’m not really planning to kill them off like that.”
When Bryan had asked whether or not Victor wanted to do that to his readers, he’d put himself at the top of that pile. Bryan was his biggest fan and supporter.
“Just venting?” Bryan raised a hopeful eyebrow.
Victor nodded. He gave the kitten a scratch behind his ears and let him down. Victor wasn’t sure of the source of the frustration he had been letting loose—or maybe he just hated consciously acknowledging it—but yeah, definitely venting.
“I hope you don’t continue a series just because you know I love it. You write in your free time because you enjoy that creative outlet, and if you aren’t having fun with it, it’s time to stop.”
“I still love writing.” Victor shrugged. “I’m on the fence whether or not to end the Gavin and Matthew series, but not writing overall. I just…I don’t know.”
“Yeah, I get it.”
If anyone understood Victor’s annual holiday blahs, it was Bryan. Much as Victor tried to suppress the undesirable feelings, they managed to push through and cast a pall over everything, even his writing. Bryan had been through it with Victor for enough years now. Victor wobbled his head as if trying to literally shake off the blues and pasted a smile on his face. “How about dinner out tonight?”
“You’re a mind reader. That’s why I went into the office…to suggest that.”
“Chinese?” There was a place they liked just five blocks away.
Bryan grinned and grabbed their coats. He pointed an index finger at Felix. “We’ll be gone only a couple hours. Behave yourself.” As if that would work. But Victor couldn’t stop a corner of his mouth from quirking up at Bryan’s lightheartedness.
Out on the street, it was darker than expected. Clouds covered the anticipated light from the full moon. Victor shivered and pulled up his collar against the chill.
Bryan nudged him. “Figure there are vampires lying in wait for us in one of the alleys?”
Victor snorted a laugh. “Doubtful.” And as many people as were out on the streets, they shouldn’t need to worry about an armed mugging either.
The not-quite-but-almost-last-minute shoppers milled about, laughing and chattering as they left one store and entered another. Jingle bells tinkled as each door opened to let people in or out.
That was the kind of thing that used to bring an easy smile to Victor’s face. Now it felt more forced. Each December as the city came to life with holiday decorations and good cheer, he deeply regretted having chosen Christmas Day to come out to his family. Needless to say, their horrific response to the news had not been tempered by holiday spirit as he’d hoped.
Why, oh, why couldn’t he have simply chosen a random summer day?
Victor sighed and took Bryan’s hand. Bryan gave it a squeeze and softly hummed along with Mariah Carey as “All I Want for Christmas Is You” drifted out from of one of the shops.
Worth it. Bryan was totally worth it. Five years ago, Victor had known in his heart that he would have to choose between his family and the man he loved, and he’d never wavered in his decision. Nor had he ever regretted it.
Still, knowing he’d made the only choice he could live with didn’t take away the pain of knowing his family now thought he was an immoral, sinful person that revolted them. It bothered him even though he was an adult, and all apron strings had been cut for years.
He’d long ago figured out that his personal value system veered sharply from theirs. If they’d been random people he’d met in his life, they wouldn’t have become friends. And it wasn’t as if he’d traveled to Iowa to see them more than once or twice a year anyway, so it wasn’t so much that he missed them in his life as that he hated having people who’d once meant everything to him—and that should support him in life regardless of something as immutable as his sexuality—thinking he was some sort of cretin.
Bryan added a jaunty little swing to their handhold, swaying their joined arms back and forth to the beat of the music. Until it stopped short—not the
music, but the arm-rocking—when the streetlamp ahead of them winked out.
“O-kay.” Victor’s eyes widened, and he steered them into a lighted doorway.
Bryan tittered a nervous laugh. “It’s just a weird coincidence.” His tone sounded like he wanted to add a reassurance-seeking, “right?” to the end of his sentence, although he didn’t.
“Yeah. Still freaking me out.” Even Victor’s voice shook. He darted a glance toward the darkened expanse ahead of them.
Bryan puffed out an uneasy breath. “Okay, generally speaking, crossing the street would be the smart move, especially since we eventually need to cross it to get to the restaurant anyway.”
“Right. This is stupid.” Victor glanced around the doorway in which they huddled and rolled his eyes. “Come on.” He clutched Bryan’s hand with more vigor than was standard, and they stepped onto the sidewalk, feigning a confidence Victor didn’t feel. His head swiveled as he checked the traffic. “We’re going to have to backtrack a bit to cross at an intersection. Traffic’s too heavy for jaywalking.”
It took them only a couple minutes to get back to the same point, but across the street. Victor kept peeking at the lamp over the alley. It remained steadily on, illuminating the street, sidewalk, and into the passageway between the two buildings where it stood.
Victor slowed their pace so they’d cross that stretch of pavement at the same time as another group coming toward them. Bryan’s body vibrated with suppressed laughter as Victor steered them to the outer edge of the sidewalk, as far from the alleyway as they could get without stepping into the street, then sped up to pass the opening as quickly as possible without looking too obviously paranoid.
People on the opposite side of the street also continued through the dimmer section without incident. Because of course they did. Even knowing he’d fallen down a rabbit hole of abnormal anxiety, Victor couldn’t help but notice how jumpy he’d become once that tension drained from his shoulders after they’d cleared the alley.
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