Min's Vampire

by Stella Blaze

  Suddenly Gabriel’s form shifted, expanding as he flipped over atop Delia, his suit shredding away from him as a giant wolf took his place. No, not a wolf. It was too big. Almost twice the size Gabriel had been, and from the neck down it was shaped almost like a human… except for the pitch black fur, and the giant sharp looking claws.

  Nope, not a vampire.

  And unbelievably Delia grabbed the wolf around the neck and picked him up and threw him off her. She sprang to her feet and raced after him. They collided with a sickening crunch.

  Lucy was still trying to pick herself up off the pavement when someone pulled her up by her armpits and set her gently against a particularly warm, soft wall. She looked up and Micah grinned down at her—he was the wall she was leaning against.

  “You okay?”

  “What’s going on?” She looked over to where the wolf and Delia were fighting, crashing into dumpsters, breaking windows.

  “Yeah,” Micah said wistfully as they both watched the battle. “They really need to get a room.”

  Dante Enoch was now on the other side of her. He stared disapprovingly at the skirmishing lovers. “Just typical.”

  Lucy took a long, slow breath, and then shook her head in confusion. “So vampires and werewolves… they’re real?”

  “And much more, Ms. Hart,” Dante murmured.

  Micah chimed in happily. “And our two species have been enemies for thousands of years—”

  “It’s not that simple,” Dante said, his gaze still on Gabriel and Delia. “We’ve enjoyed two centuries of peace. A truce, if you would. And if either King found out of this, war would be inevitable.”

  “And that would be—” Micah stopped in mid-sentence, Dante’s stern gaze making him gulp and choose an obviously more serious last word. “Bad… it would be bad.”

  Out of nowhere a man appeared beside Micah. He was pale and blond, with cool blue eyes and the most expressionless face. His hair was slicked back from his face, and was long enough to be in a ponytail that fell halfway down his back.

  Without having to ask, Lucy knew he was a vampire too. She could feel the same cold dead feeling radiating from him as from Delia.

  “Your sister and Gabriel are making a mess out of this alley.” Micah was chuckling as he said it.

  “Yes, Vin,” Dante said stiffly, as if speaking to the vampire was a hardship. “Would you be so kind as to rein Delia in?”

  The blond vampire slid a cold glance Dante’s way, and then walked confidently over to the battling couple. He waited a beat as they pushed away from each other, and before they had a chance to latch onto each other again he put himself between the two. He held a hand up to warn off the werewolf, and then he turned to his sister.

  “You have to stop this.”

  “Mind your own business!” She tried to move past him, but he kept himself in front of her.

  “Think, Delia. You’re fighting your lover.”

  The word lover struck Lucy quite literally in the heart. She’d never thought one word could cause her actual physical pain, but there it was. One little word, not even a very long one, and she felt it stab through her like a knife. She forced herself to take a deep, painful breath—it felt as if the knife in her heart was really there—and then she let it out.

  Tears burnt at the backs of her eyes, threatening to fill her eyes with their hot wetness. But Lucy clamped her eyes shut on them. She would not start crying, not for something so impossibly wrong. It had been just a job—being Gabriel’s fiancée, a means to an end—and she needed to get back to thinking that way, to believing it.

  Vin’s voice cut through Lucy’s reverie. “What if you hurt him?”

  “He’s… he’s…” Delia was pointing at Gabriel. Her blue eyes welled up with tears, her harsh voice faltering as she looked from her brother to Gabriel. At least she had a real reason to be crying.

  “And her!” She was now thrusting her finger in Lucy’s direction, and even though she was still crying, the hatred in those watery blue eyes was scorching.

  “But he’s in love with you, Delia.”

  Lucy hadn’t noticed, but Gabriel had shifted back to his human form, and now he was moving to Vin’s side, his face full of affection, his eyes beseeching.

  Lucy suddenly looked away, embarrassed: Gabriel was naked, not a stitch of clothing on him, just a thin sheen of sweat that made his skin glisten, and made every curve and cut of his body stand out.

  “I’m only doing this for you.” Gabriel’s voice was rough and thick.

  Delia sobbed into her hands. “I know, I know. I just didn’t realize…”

  “That I’d have to act the part of an engaged man?” Gabriel walked steadily toward her until he had her shoulders in his hands—just as he’d held Lucy’s only a few minutes ago.

  Delia crumpled into his bare arms and buried her face into the flesh of his chest. “I didn’t realize it would hurt so much.”

  “Freaking love birds!” Micah growled with a smile on his handsome face.

  “We should leave them alone,” Dante said.

  Lucy looked over to Delia and Gabriel. He held her in his arms, whispering things to her, stroking her golden hair. Most of him was obscured by Delia’s body pressing against his, but his shoulders and chest were luminous in their nakedness.

  Lucy’s gaze flicked over to Vin and she was surprised to find he was staring right at her, his blue eyes not a bit cold—he was looking at her as if he wanted to eat her.

  Which he just might want to… Lucy turned as Dante and Micah helped her walk, each lending her an arm. Which was good. Her legs were like rubber, and her knees kept knocking.

  “So,” Lucy said as she walked along between the two werewolves, desperately trying to push the bewildering tangle of emotions out of her head. “Is there anyone that doesn’t know about this little…?”

  “Shit storm?” Micah chortled.

  “Arrangement?” Dante corrected.

  “Yeah…that.”

  “Well,” Dante said. “Gabriel’s parents, and of course, Delia’s.”

  “And anyone who might want Gabriel dead.” Micah seemed to ponder this. “You’d be surprised how many.”

  Lucy felt the pressure and tension evaporate when they stepped out of the cramped little alley and stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of La Companion Refectory. A sly north wind blew around and through them, making Lucy feel unaccountably better. She gently pulled her arms free of Dante’s and Micah’s grasp. “I’m going to need more money,” she announced. She looked right into Dante’s light brown eyes. “That alright with you?”

  Dante and Micah exchanged a smile as Dante nodded. “You might just be the right girl for this job after all.”

  Chapter 12

  LUCY sat in the dim light that shone from the small wall lamp over the stove. It had red roosters on its shade. Her coffee had turned cold long ago, yet she still held the cup in her hand. Her arm lay limply against the waxy plastic of the tablecloth covering her grandmother’s kitchen table. Too many things drifted and raced and throbbed in her head. Each thought sizzled with its own heat, pulled at her with its own weight.

  There was the kiss: the feel, the taste and scent of that memory, when Gabriel had held her and kissed her in front of his entire family. It hadn’t felt like just part of the act, the game. But it was connected to the little spectacle in the alley. How she’d almost been killed. How his real lady love had nearly strangled her to death. Maybe she was even going to tear her throat out? That’s what vampires did, wasn’t it?

  And Lucy couldn’t blame her. She wasn’t really anything to Gabriel, not anything real, and she felt jealousy flaring hot and unwanted in her soul, in her heart—all for a man she really didn’t know. No, she couldn’t blame the vampire for her reaction.

  She actually smelt Lucy on Gabriel, and the other way around—and she’d been able to smell their want, their lust for each other.

  Creepy!

  Lucy shook her head, sitting th
ere in the dim warmth of the kitchen. She felt so safe in her grandmother’s kitchen. She wanted her to be there with her, more than anything, so she could tell her about the crazy, horrific things that had been happening to her. But she couldn’t.

  For one thing how could she tell her sainted grandmother there were such things as werewolves and vampires… and who knew what else?

  Gram would lock me up for sure.

  But then a really terrifying thought crossed Lucy’s mind, sending a chill up her spine and making her stomach sink to her buttery Italian leather heels: I’d have to tell her that the werewolf was my fiancé…

  Hell no! Lucy would rather face a battalion of love scorned vampires than have to tell her grandmother that she had been engaged for the last month… and hiding it, and lying about it… and that she was being paid to do so.

  Nope. Gram would kill me for sure. Repeatedly.

  She finally got up and poured the cold coffee out into the sink, washed the mug and set it on the drain-board to dry. She dried her hands on a dishtowel and then noticed she was still wearing the red silk dress. There was amazingly little damage from her violent encounter with the vampire. A smudge here, a beveling in the threading there, but overall the dress could be mended, and after dry cleaning it would be as good as new. But did she really want to wear it again? It had seemed so beautiful and romantic looking, and she’d felt so wonderful in it, like she was in a chic, modern-day fairytale. But after what had happened to her while she was wearing it, she wasn’t so sure anymore—the monsters in the fairytale being real made the tale less alluring.

  She had to smile though. This has to be the most expensive dress anyone’s ever washed dishes in.

  ~*~

  The next morning Lucy was yanked out of a perfectly lovely, if not erotic, dream about Gabriel… and the blond vampire Vin… awoken by her grandmother’s angry voice.

  “Lucinda Marie Hart! Why is there the scent of a vampire on your dirty clothes?” She was holding the dress Lucy had been wearing the night before. Lucy silently thanked god that her grandmother hadn’t asked how she’d paid for the dress—but then she realized her grandmother was interrogating her about there being vampire scent on her clothes.

  Gram wrinkled her nose and held the dress even farther away from her. “And werewolf?”

  Oh crap! Lucy hadn’t devised a plan for getting through this. Her grandmother was going to kill her. And when gram told her mother, Lila was going to hit the roof. I’ll be grounded for eternity.

  But you’re eighteen, a voice said. But just then something momentous dawned on her.

  “Gram, how can you smell that on my clothes?”

  Gram suddenly got this look on her face of complete shock, as if now she was the one in trouble. Yet just as abruptly her grandmother’s expression changed and the two women fixed each other with the same hard stare. For sixty long seconds they glared at each other.

  Gram finally spoke.

  “Your mother’s gone already, and Seth is gulping down his breakfast as we speak. So if you take a long shower,” she held the dirty clothing out from her as far as she could as she turned to leave, “then we can talk.”

  Lucy just sat there on her bed, staring opened mouth at the open door to her room. What the hell? Then she gave herself a cursory sniff. Did she really just tell me I stink?

  ~*~

  After a long hot shower, Lucy changed into a pair of jeans and cute little pink tank top with lips drawn in red glitter across it. Taking a reinforcing breath she headed down stairs to have it out with her grandmother. She still couldn’t get over her grandmother being able to smell vampires and werewolves. And how does she know about vampires and werewolves, either?

  Gram poured Lucy a cup of coffee and already had a plate filled with eggs, sausage, and fried potatoes. Lucy wasn’t going to eat it, but she really was starving, so she grudgingly sat down and took a few hasty bites, and washed them down with the coffee her grandmother had just handed her.

  Then she started.

  “How the hell can you smell vampires and werewolves? I was up close and personal with them and didn’t smell a thing.” Lucy’s grandmother took a breath, about to speak, but Lucy cut across her. “No, no! What I really want to know is how do you even know they exist?”

  Gram stared her down, and Lucy could feel herself losing ground in the conversation fast.

  “What I’d like to know, before I tell you anything, young lady, is why you were in their company in the first place?”

  “Oh, um…” Lucy hadn’t thought up a good excuse for that yet. She gulped and then nervously took another sip of her coffee. What’s a good reason to be in the company of monsters? By the time she said, “I just ran into them last night,” her grandmother already had a look of total disbelief on her face.

  “Okay, I knew the werewolf from before...” she hesitated, trying to think of a better, more benign excuse, but this wasn’t one of her back stabbing acolytes back in San Bernardino. This was her grandmother, who was the only person in her entire family who truly loved her. She couldn’t just lie to her. And Lucy was getting the distinct impression that her grandmother knew a hell of a lot more about this new and exciting world of monsters than she was letting on.

  Lucy was in over her head, and since she knew nothing of these things before last night, she decided the truth would not only be the easiest path, but would yield the most gain. Gram could help her... maybe.

  “I’ve known the werewolf for four weeks,”

  “Is he your boyfriend?”

  Lucy shook her head. Her words came in a fast, furious wave. “We’re engaged, and no, it’s not a for real kind of thing, it’s just a business arrangement, and I didn’t know he was a... and then there was this blonde bitch, she’s the... vampire.”—it still felt weird saying the words vampire and werewolf out loud— “Turns out she’s the one he should be engaged to, but since they’re different species, their families wouldn’t take it too well. I really just thought he was gay or something, and needed me to be his beard. That was until the vampire tried killing me. I knew she was one, you know, a vampire, right off. And then Gabe came out of the restaurant and wolfed-out and stopped her.”

  Lucy halted. The scene from the alley flashed before her eyes, and with it the rollercoaster ride her emotions had taken her on—one moment feeling like she was falling for Gabe, the next moment she was terrified the blonde vampire chick was going to kill her, then confusion and fear as Gabe came to her rescue and she saw him change into his wolf form. It was just too much to sort through.

  And then there was the way he was with psycho Delia. How could he be in love with a nut-job monster like her?

  Monsters of a feather, her bitchy inner voice jibed.

  Her grandmother just sat there staring.

  “Oh, and we were at the engagement party when all this happened. Not in the restaurant, but in the alley behind it.”

  Gram cleared her throat and then very calmly asked “Engagement?”

  “It’s just for show, though no one can know that it’s all fake and all.” The way Gram was staring at her, Lucy just couldn’t stop the heedless stream of words from coming out of her mouth. “I’m getting paid a lot of money to be his fake fiancée. A ton, actually. Enough that I’ll be able to go to any college I want.”

  Gram just stared at her, her expression unwavering.

  “So I can get my future back!” Lucy almost screamed.

  Gram rolled her eyes, picked up her coffee cup and took a long, leisurely drink, seeming to savor the taste of her coffee as she contemplated everything Lucy had just confessed.

  “You’re telling me, then, that you entered into a fabricated engagement, to supplement your life style,”—she didn’t miss much, did she?—“and to ensure your future education. And now you’ve found yourself not only in league with werewolves, but a vampire wants you dead?”

  “Yep, that’s about it.” Lucy tried to smile away how much trouble that sounded like.

/>   “And if it weren’t for your fake fiancé, you’d be dead?”

  “Yeah… okay, that sounds really bad but it’s not as bad as…” Her grandmother was giving her the “cut the crap” look. Lucy lowered her head in defeat. “Yes… probably.”

  Gram shook her head and was about to speak, but Lucy said, “I mean, Gabe pulled her away, and they fought it out, but...” How can I say this and not sound completely crazy? But then again, vampires and werewolves being real was pretty crazy to start with. “I think I kind of forced her to let me go. I mean, I just told her to let me go. Actually I couldn’t even talk! I thought for her to let me go, and then suddenly she just did.”

  “She let go of you?” Gram suddenly looked very interested.

  “Yeah… she looked as shocked about it as I was.” Lucy looked away as she replayed what had happened. “It was like something… some force coming out of me was holding her back. It really did a number on me. I’m still beat.”

  Lucy’s grandmother smiled.

  “Do you know what this all means?” Lucy asked, feeling apprehensive because her grandmother was smiling like a maniacal Cheshire cat.

  “I think I do,” she said, standing up and retrieving her purse, her prescription sunglasses, and her car keys. “But I think we need to road test it first.”

  Lucy frowned as she followed her grandmother out the back door. “Road test what?”

  ~*~

  Gram drives like a snail, Lucy thought. It was the second time she’d driven with her grandmother, but she had been in a crying mini-coma the last time, covered in special sauce, and teetering on the edge of disaster. She didn’t remember her grandmother driving so slowly, and the way she kept looking over to the side of the road… Lucy wondered if her grandmother could see any more. Was she looking for an exit?