Her Vampire Obsession

by Richardson, Lesli

  Driving past the club first to appraise the location, I see a line for entry stringing halfway down the block. Lucius told me to walk up to the doorman, who would admit me immediately. Vampires never have to stand in line. But to also give my name, and one of his men would show me around.

  Nightclubs like this aren’t my preferred hunting grounds, but since my only chance to find out more about the source of that particular vintage Lucius teased me with last night is through attending tonight…

  Well, here I am.

  I find a parking spot for the Audi Q3 a block away and walk back. I opted to wear a suit and blazer tonight, and the collar and top button of my shirt lay open. When I walk up to the entrance, I’m barely given a glance by the vampire manning the door before the velvet rope is opened, and I’m waved in.

  “Dexter Van Sussex,” I say to another suit-clad vampire I assume is a bouncer, who stands in the entry to the coat check room.

  “Yes, sir. You are expected. Please, follow me.” I figured he’d lead me downstairs to the dungeon, but he doesn’t. Instead, he leads me inside, past the dance floor, which is teeming with humans who don’t know they’re being hunted by several vampires among them. The DJ has them bouncing around and the air is thick with sweat tinged with alcohol, desire, and hunger. We continue on past the bar, where a blue-haired waitress not dressed like the rest of the servers is currently taking care of customers, and into a back hallway.

  There, he punches in a code to unlock a door to the stairwell, and I’m led upstairs, where he unlocks another door and leads me into an office suite. A faint, pleasant scent tickles my nose, but I don’t have time to pause and savor it before I’m being led down another hallway and through another door into an office.

  The vampire king, of course, occupies the largest office.

  “Ah, there he is.” Lucius stands and rounds the desk he was sitting behind to shake with me. No cheap IKEA flat-pack desk, either. This Brobdingnagian monstrosity is totally Lucius, easily six feet across, ornately carved mahogany and polished to a luxurious sheen. It’s too large to fit up the stairwell I just ascended.

  “How in holy hell did you even get this up here?”

  He proudly smiles. “Do you like it?”

  “It’s…you.”

  He smirks. “They built the office around it. Literally. It was brought up and then the stairwell enclosed, and the walls built.”

  “You always were one to put on a show.” The walls are ornate wood paneling with built-in bookshelves, making it look more like a study that belongs in a mansion instead of a nightclub office.

  “What’s the use of having this long life and all these funds if I can’t be a showoff on occasion?”

  I prefer my luxury more subtly stated and less likely to draw attention. “I am here.” I don’t want him to get sidetracked. “And you damn well know why.”

  He grins. “Thought about it all day, didn’t you?”

  “If I skip right to admitting you’re right, will it earn me an introduction sooner?”

  “Perhaps.” The office door opens, and Selene enters. “Ah, my love. Is everything ready?”

  “Yes.” She’s also smiling.

  If this were any other vampire besides Lucius, I’d be expecting a trap, a betrayal. “Why are you so eager for me to meet the source?”

  His smile fades. “Time and my recent change of circumstances has made me see things in ways I have not in centuries. Perhaps you are not as maudlin about humans as I once thought you to be. By that I mean the validity of your feelings about and toward them. Perhaps you were the one who was correct.”

  He holds out a hand to Selene, and she drifts over to him, where she curls against his side. The blatant love I see between them isn’t something any vampire can fake.

  It’s also something I find myself envying in nearly painful ways right now.

  “Love changes a man,” he continues. “Had you not admitted the idea of greeting the sun, I likely would have kept our little secret to ourselves. However, even I know when there are things beyond my ken, both in knowledge as well as experience and abilities.” He sighs. “Perhaps I’m simply being a romantic, and there won’t be an attraction between you two. But…I can hope. While there is no immediate danger, you and I shall talk later. I want you to meet them first.”

  “They’re…in danger?” The thought irrationally triggers something strongly protective within me.

  “I do not know. And no,” he quickly adds, “I’m not being deliberately cagey. There is a history I’m certain I do not know all the facts about.” He slips his arm around Selene’s waist and draws her closer. “Did you ever hear about the gwyllgi?”

  I nod, and the way he asks it tickles something in my deepest, darkest memories. “Are…are we talking shifters again?”

  He slowly shakes his head. “Just keep it in mind for later. I could be wrong, but it’s what I thought of. Then again, I don’t know all the details. There might be more facts surrounding this mystery than I am aware.” He releases Selene and steps forward. “Come on. Let’s see what happens.”

  We return downstairs to the ground floor level, which houses the nightclub. I follow Lucius and Selene as we make our way along the fringes of the dance floor, on the far side of the space from the bar. We aim for the lounge seating area, where one of his men holds a table open for us. I’m painfully aware of the prickling feeling in my mouth, the memory of last night’s drink, and I fight the urge to beg Lucius to quit the games and introduce me.

  We settle at the table and one of his household humans hurries over to take our order. The woman wears short black shorts, a perfectly pressed button-up dress shirt, and a black ribbon tied around her neck.

  Lucius leans in and gives her our order, for alcoholic drinks, not “house specialties.” She hurries away, heading to the bar.

  She is not the special vintage—that much I can tell. She’s been blooded before, by teeth, not a needle. The eager hunger she exuded as she looked me over tells me that much, and I’m certain if I untie the black ribbon around her throat, I’ll find plenty of old fang marks on her.

  Sensing Lucius’ gaze on me, I watch the waitress as she leans over the bar and speaks to the blue-haired woman behind it.

  Unlike the other servers, the blue-haired beauty wears a black Club Toxic T-shirt, and the neon pink logo across her round breasts lights up from the black lights scattered here and there.

  No ribbon around her neck, no sign of a collar.

  From the way both of them glance over at our table, I know the server has informed the bartender who the order is for. The bartender then sets about mixing our drinks.

  Lucius leans in. “By the way, anything you order here is on my tab. I’ll make sure the staff knows.”

  “Thank you,” I idly say, still focused on the blue-haired woman behind the bar. “I appreciate that.”

  “Save your thanks, Dexter.” He smiles. “I do so hate to make a man repeat himself.”

  4

  Eilidh

  It’s a busy night, but then, all nights at Club Toxic are some varying degree of busy. Even Tuesdays, like tonight. We open at seven, and it’s slow at first, until about eight. The floor starts to fill with eagerly gyrating, half-drunk, two-legged Lunchables, and there will soon be a line down the block of people waiting to get in.

  I start out working the tables in the lounge, running back and forth to the bar with drink orders. I don’t mind because some of the vamps are really good tippers, and every little bit counts.

  Especially since I don’t have to share tips. One of the special concessions Lucius gives me.

  A little after nine, I’ve just delivered drinks to a table in the lounge when Augustus saunters my way with a vampire I’ve never seen before in tow. The new guy is a redhead, kind of thin, maybe around six feet tall, and looks like he was turned in his late forties. If he were human, I’d say his air is the kind of swagger a rich guy used to getting his way throws around a corporate boardroom
before he fucks his secretary over his desk and then goes home to his trophy wife and kids whose names he can barely remember.

  I instantly don’t like him, but I don’t fear him, either. He’s definitely not dressed nearly as well as Lucius’ men.

  Augustus leans in. “This is Dagwood,” he says.

  Rolling my eyes, I slowly shake my head. “Seriously?”

  Augustus grins. “It’s as good a name as any. He wanted to meet you.”

  The guy has green eyes, and I look him dead in them. “Hiya,” I say, holding my hand out. “Nice to meet you…” I wait for him to tell me his real name.

  It takes him a moment. “Darren,” he says, already thrown off his game as he hesitates before finally taking my hand.

  Augustus stands there with his arms crossed over his chest, smiling, waiting for the show to begin.

  Darren’s gaze narrows as he studies me. “You’re…human?”

  “That’s what they tell me.” I hold my tray against me to hide my boobs. Force of habit, even though he’s looking me right in the eyes and not eyeing my girls. “What can I do for you, Darren?”

  He glances at my name tag. “Your name is Blue?”

  Tiberius walks over. “Did she do it yet?”

  “Not yet,” Augustus says. Behind him, Maximus also walks up to listen in, as do a few of the human regulars. They’ve formed an impromptu circle around us, my back to the wall and Darren standing close, but not uncomfortably so.

  I reach up and flick my blue tresses. “My name, tonight, is Blue.”

  “So…it’s not your real name?”

  He can’t look away from my gaze now, and it’s got to be freaking him out at least a little. “What’s in a name, anyway?” I softly ask. “How old are you? Really?” As I ask that, I do my thing—which is basically think all this to him, in addition to saying it.

  Compelling him.

  “One hundred and thirty-four,” he whispers back without hesitation, and I know I’ve got him. It works better sometimes than others, but this guy’s not very strong. His sire was likely young, too. While I’m immune to vampires’ thrall, I can’t compel all of them like this, although I haven’t yet met a human I haven’t been able to use at least a little mojo on.

  Between the music and the vamp bouncers doing crowd control around us, I know the humans paying attention only heard “thirty-four.”

  Oooh, this will freak the poor vamp out later, when he has time to think about it.

  I narrow my gaze. “How badly do you want to know my name?”

  One of the household humans giggles. She should be serving customers, but she’ll also immediately spread the word that I played the name tag game, and that’ll only help my cred around here.

  “I’d…do anything to know it.”

  “Want to make a wager?”

  He nods.

  “I bet you’re just dying to get me downstairs, aren’t you?”

  “I’d love for you to come downstairs with me.”

  Of course he would, the poor schmuck. “Got a C-note on you?”

  He nods again, eagerly, and digs out his wallet. If he thinks he’s getting off that easy, he’s not, but at least he’s got cash.

  Booyah. There’s my cell phone bill, paid for the month.

  “Here are the rules: I will let you see the back of my name tag. My real name is on it. If you can pronounce it correctly, on the first try, I’ll go downstairs with you. If you can’t, I get the hundred. You never get another chance to play the game—just this once. You also can never reveal to anyone what it said. Deal?”

  “Deal!”

  “Now, when you try to pronounce it, keep your voice down.” I wish I could say I know exactly what I do to them, but I don’t. Except I know it’s working, because his pupils have fully dilated, making his green eyes look nearly black in this light. It’s a pretty neat party trick.

  You know, among the fang-endowed crowd.

  “Okay.”

  I cup my left hand over the front of my name tag. Holding my tray up so it hides both our faces and my name tag from those gathered around us, I tip my name tag forward enough that the writing on the back is visible.

  But I’m still looking him in the eyes, and he’s not looking away.

  “Go ahead and try,” I say, while I’m thinking to him that he has no clue how to say it.

  Not that most people have a clue to start with. I have yet to meet anyone who does.

  He glances at it, then immediately back to my eyes. “I…um…” I release my name tag and lower the tray as he stares into my eyes. “Uh… I… It’s…” He swallows, and I pluck the hundred from his fingers.

  “Thank you so much for playing,” I sweetly say. I offer him a smile as cheers and laughter go up among the onlookers.

  The guy looks dazed as I tuck my winnings into my sports bra. Augustus slaps the guy on the back, whacking him between the shoulder blades. Darren still looks stunned and probably will for a couple of minutes, if the past is any indicator.

  “Come on, buddy,” Augustus says. “I’ll buy you a drink.”

  “I… Uh…”

  When I head back toward the bar, I’m not surprised that Maximus sidles up alongside me. “One of these days, my dear, you will tell me how you do that trick of yours.”

  “That would spoil it, though,” I remind him.

  What I don’t want to admit—and what only Selene and Lucius know—is that I have no clue how I do it.

  Absolutely none.

  As a human, when I look a vampire in the eyes, I should be completely in their thrall, and…I’m not. Quite the opposite.

  I can’t completely compel a vampire or a human the way a vampire can, but anyone who stares into my eyes like that, they usually end up…

  Like Darren. Their wits get sort of knocked off-kilter for a moment, at the very least. I don’t know if it’s because I have powers, or I scramble their power and bounce it back to them, or what.

  Oh, he’ll be okay in a few minutes, but he’ll have no fucking clue what my name tag said, and he’ll be unable to remember it.

  Like I said, I don’t know how I do it. I just…do it. Lucius learned about my immunity to the thrall almost immediately when we first met and started talking. He didn’t believe me when I told him about it, I guess. I discovered my secret talent by accident the first time I worked for a vampire, at a bar in Toronto. I was nineteen. By then, while I knew vampires and shifters supposedly existed, because of the fringe circles Mom and I lived and worked in while she was alive, I didn’t realize they were…real.

  The bar’s owner, a vampire named Neimus, liked me because he didn’t have to worry about the vampires trying to hit on me or get free drinks from me. From the second I met him, I knew exactly what he was when he tried to charm me and failed.

  Fortunately, my stupidity—“Oh, my god! You are a vampire!”—didn’t get me killed when I looked at him and accidentally did the scrambling thing on him. Neimus helped me realize exactly how different I was from other humans in terms of my abilities, and he helped me learn how to safely navigate a shadowy world that few humans are privileged enough to walk through, much less survive and thrive in.

  I loved that job and my boss. I lasted there nearly two years before I had to go on the run again.

  That’s also where the name tag game first developed. Although, back then, I just went by Blondie, regardless of which wig I wore at the time. Then, I only had three from which to choose, two of them blonde and one black. And I took a twenty from my marks instead of a hundred.

  I’ve gone up in the world.

  And no, I don’t use my power on Lucius and Selene beyond my initial demonstration of it. I’m not stupid. That’d be disrespectful. I try not to use it on any of his men because, again, respect. They won’t harm a hair on my head with Lucius and Selene protecting me. They also won’t allow any harm to come to me. That would sign anyone’s death warrant, and they know it.

  But humans and other vamps?
/>   Fuck yeah, I do it.

  It works on some shifters, a little, but not on others. I really don’t push that, though. I don’t want them knowing I can do it. I have everything with that situation balanced delicately enough as it is. I don’t want them thinking I’m more on the vampires’ side than on theirs. Garrett Green and his mate, Amber, know I am immune to the thrall, but they don’t know the extent of what I can do. They’ve also agreed to keep that secret.

  If Amber’s seen what I can do in one of her visions, she hasn’t admitted it to me.

  A little after ten, I’m taking a turn behind the bar on the main floor when I do a double-take. Because, son of a bitch, it looks like Tiberius is leading actor Gareth David-Lloyd across the club and toward the back hallway.

  Helloooo, Sweetie.

  I mean, yeah, we’ve had VIPs in here before, even several A-list celebs. Ironically, Lucius doesn’t want too many of them gracing the club’s doorstep. He wants the place hopping every night, but on a local level and not attracting paparazzi or crazy crowds. A low-key, steady success that is sustainable and doesn’t draw any of the bad kind of attention.

  Also, Lucius doesn’t want a celebrity accidentally getting harmed while or immediately after being here. Usually, he personally takes them in hand, and before they leave, they’re given a gentle mental nudge not to return or talk about the club to people. Not a mind wipe, because in the case of a celebrity that might trigger more questions than can be comfortably dealt with.

  But Ianto fucking Jones?

  My heart skips a little. Torchwood is one of my favorite shows. Normally, I keep my chill, but I have got to meet that man before he leaves tonight, actor or not.

  I quickly lose track of them because I take a couple of orders and start mixing drinks.

  Since I’m focused, that’s why I flinch when Selene suddenly whispers in my ear.

  “Play the name tag game again. He wants to be amused.”

  The “who” wanting to be amused doesn’t need clarification—her king. I also don’t bother turning. I know she can hear me just fine, even as I whisper in reply, “Who with?”