Bad Blood

by Mari Mancusi

  “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to take this out on you. I’m just . . . well, the whole thing just makes me a little crazy if you didn’t notice,” I confess.

  Heather nods, reaching over and touching my hand with her own. I can’t help but notice how smooth her fingertips are as they lightly stroke my palms. An almost magical touch that provides an instant soothing.

  “I know,” she says. “And I understand better than you can imagine. If you ever want to talk, please know I’m here. No matter what it is you have to say.”

  I can feel the tears rushing to my eyes now, tears I don’t want her to see fall. I want to tell her I’ll never be ready to talk to her. That she’s an abomination, a whore, a homewrecker, and someone I’ll hate forever. But I can’t bring myself to do it. Can’t bear to see the hurt in her wide blue eyes. I push my chair back and stand up quickly, wanting to get away but not sure where to go.

  “Look, I actually have to head out to work now,” Heather says, rising from her own chair as well. “And I won’t be back until morning. So why don’t you sleep in my bed tonight? This way you won’t have to deal with Crystal.” She smiles wryly. “My daughter can be a bit much, especially when you’re not feeling well.”

  She’s so nice. If only she were an evil stepmother like from a fairy tale. It’d make it so much easier to hate her. But I nod in agreement, too afraid of how choked my voice will sound if I try to speak. She tells me there are fresh sheets and towels in the linen closet, then grabs her purse and says good-bye. Almost as if she’s purposely trying to give me space. I don’t want to appreciate her gesture as much as I do.

  I finish eating and put my plate in the dishwasher, then pack the leftovers into the fridge. When I’m done, I head down the hall, in search of her bedroom. It’s two doors down and decorated in contemporary white, like the rest of the apartment. There’s only one difference.

  This room smells like Dad.

  I’d recognize his aftershave anywhere. As a kid I used to have him prop me up on the bathroom counter so I could watch him shave, fascinated by every stroke. I’d tell him I wanted to shave, too, which would make him laugh. He’d dab my nose with a dollop of shaving cream and tickle me ’til I begged for mercy.

  I collapse on the bed, no longer interested in changing the sheets. I hug my knees and breathe in deeply, inhaling his familiar scent. Even though it should make me mad, mad that he’s not here after he said he would be, it smells comforting and I feel my body give in.

  I roll over and feel a lump in my pocket. My cell phone. Pulling it out, I sleepily click through to check for messages. But there are none. None from my high-roller of a sister and none from my boyfriend either. I’m not too surprised about Rayne—she seemed pretty preoccupied at the blackjack table—but it is strange that Magnus hasn’t called. On nights we can’t hang out back home he always calls at eleven p.m. on the dot, to wish me good-night and sweet dreams. Guess he’s too busy tonight, distracted by all those consortium sessions.

  Or is it by Jane?

  I remember her words to Cowboy Man, about giving Magnus some attention since I’m not around to do it, and the lump returns to my throat once again. First Dad, now Magnus. It seems like no matter what I do I can’t stop the men in my life from abandoning me for other women.

  I can’t believe I’d been ready to give up my precious virginity for him. To let him go where no man has gone before. That was a pretty big step for me. A step of faith, of trust, of me opening up to him and saying I believe you love me and won’t hurt me as I’ve been hurt before.

  And then she shows up and the next thing I know he’s running off to Vegas to get legally hitched, vampire style. How can he say that’s not a big deal? That I shouldn’t be worried or jealous about Jane?

  Why hasn’t he called? According to the schedule I looked at, the convention sessions should be over by now. Did Jane talk him into going dancing with her at Rumjungle or some other hot Vegas club maybe? I try to imagine the scene. Magnus, not the best dancer in the world by any stretch of the imagination, would try to keep the beat as best he can while Jane grinds up against him, her sultry, voluptuous body draped in the barest minimum of gauzy fabric required to skirt public nudity laws (which, let’s face it, in Vegas probably aren’t all that strict).

  And what happens next, my cruel imagination wonders. They’ll grow tired of the noise of the club and go somewhere quiet to talk? Like his hotel room, perhaps? I’m sure, unlike me, Jane’s no babe in the woods. She’ll seduce him slowly, pulling him down on the bed and doing to him what I’ve never been able to do myself. She’ll rock his world and he’ll forget my name as he’s screaming out hers.

  Yeah, no wonder he forgot to call me. I might forget to call me, too, if I were having the best sex of my life.

  I consider calling him myself, but find I can’t bring my fingers to punch in his number. Mostly because I don’t think I can handle the chance that she might answer his phone and tell me he’s in the shower or something and can’t come to the phone.

  No! I shake my head. I can’t think like this. I can’t spiral down into a delusionary pit of despair based on some ridiculous wild thoughts. Magnus would never cheat on me. Not with Jane, not with anyone. He’s the best boyfriend ever. Loyal, loving, patient, true. Even if he has been distracted lately . . .

  I’m sure there’s a very good explanation for why he didn’t call tonight. Maybe he’s stuck in a session that’s gone over its time. Or he left his cell phone in the room. Or maybe it’s out of batteries or was stolen by a petty thief. There are a million different possibilities for why he didn’t call me that have nothing to do with him hooking up with Jane.

  I have to trust him. There’s nothing without trust. And once I figure out who Jane really is—and what her evil game might be—I’ll expose her for the fake she is and save the day. Then Magnus will thank me, grateful tears in his eyes, and he’ll banish Jane from the Blood Coven, never to return.

  And then he’ll be mine, all mine. Forever.

  10

  I sleep surprisingly well, considering all that’s running through my mind, and don’t awake until a cruel burst of bright white light assaults my eyelids the next morning. At first I’m confused—not sure where I am—I’ve been in such a deep sleep. But then I notice the pair of fuzzy dice hanging from a lamp beside me. Ah yes. Vegas. My stepmom and father’s bed to be precise.

  And the bringer of the unwanted light? My dear, dear prodigal sister, home from her adventures at long last.

  “There you are!” she cries, plopping down on the bed. “I had to wake up both Crystal and Stormy looking for you. And let’s just say our lovely stepsister, Crystal, is not a morning person by any stretch of the imagination. Why are you in here, sleeping in the den of sin anyway?”

  I glance over at the digital clock sitting on the nightstand. Five A.M. Which is, I suppose, eight A.M. back East where we live. But still not a reasonable time to be woken up on a day you don’t have to go to school.

  I rub my eyes and sit up in bed. “Are you just getting in?” I ask, realizing that’s the only explanation to Rayne’s sudden presence. Sure enough, she’s still wearing her clothes from the night before and smells more than a bit ripe. “Were you out all night?”

  “Of course. I am a vampire, after all,” Rayne replies in a completely unwarranted “duh” voice. “Creature of the night and all that?”

  “Right. Except you’re one of the mutant vamps that can go out during the day,” I remind her. “So really not that perfect of an excuse.”

  “Oh my God, Sunny, I love it here so much!” Rayne gushes, completely ignoring my jab. “It’s like the best place ever. A dream come true. I played craps ’til two A.M. over at the Bellagio with a guy who turned out to be an actual Saudi prince. Like a real life sheik, complete with turban. He bought a bottle of this Cristal champagne—costing more than a thousand dollars—and split it with me. And then Paris Hilton showed up to our table wearing the most ridiculous pink and
white bunny outfit—like it was Halloween or something. Evidently she knows the guy from some club in Dubai. And so he made her blow on the dice for luck. But she totally got snake eyes and he ended up losing like thirty thousand dollars. But he was all like, ‘Whatever, I make that every five minutes from my dad’s oil biz.’ At three A.M. I was up two thousand dollars.”

  “At three A.M.?” I repeated. “What about now?”

  She shrugs. “Oh. Well, I can’t really remember. I think I’m down a bit. But I’m going to make it all back tonight. The sheik got me into this top-secret high-rollers poker game. Just need a few hours’ sleep.” She attempts to yank the covers off me and wrap them around herself.

  I tighten my grip on the blanket. “I’m not so sure you should sleep in here,” I tell her. “After all, Heather might come back from work and want her bed back.”

  Rayne huffs and sits back up. “She’s working?” she exclaims. “Now? What is she, some kind of hooker?”

  “You know, lots of people are stuck working the graveyard shift,” I remind her, feeling the need to defend the stepmother who was nice enough to give up her own bed when I needed it. “Especially in a place like Vegas where creatures of the night—like you, evidently—crawl the streets until the sun starts to rise.”

  “Oh my God. I bet she’s a stripper,” Rayne concludes, completely ignoring my rational, sensible explanation. “That’s got to be it. HWB is a tawdry, cheap Vegas stripper. How awesome is that?”

  “I really doubt she’s a stripper, Rayne.”

  My sister shoots me a suspicious glare. “Why are you suddenly all rah-rah Stepmom?”

  I shrug. “I don’t know. She’s actually pretty nice. She bought us all this Chinese food and—”

  “Oh please.” Rayne rolls her eyes. “Sun, once again you prove to be the most naïve girl on the planet. Chinese food? Don’t you remember what this woman did? She stole our mother’s husband—our father—right out from under us and dragged him out West, never to be heard from again. She deserves nothing short of our complete and utter contempt that should not be diluted by freaking Chinese food.”

  I shrug uncomfortably. I so don’t feel like getting in an argument this early in the morning, but at the same time, Rayne’s refusal to see this situation as anything other than black and white is really starting to get on my nerves. Sure, I’m still not pleased about what Heather and my father did years ago, but as she reminded me last night, we don’t know the whole story. And until we do, we might not want to judge her too harshly.

  “I bet she’s out there right now, taking off her clothes for dirty old men so they’ll stuff dollars in her G-string,” Rayne continues, undaunted. I groan.

  “You know what, think what you will,” I tell her, giving up the blanket and crawling out of bed, realizing there’s no sleep left for me, at least here. “You always do.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “Are you even going to help me at all during this trip?” I demand. “I can’t do this without you, you know.”

  “Help you what?” Rayne asks. “Oh. The Jane thing. Sure. I told you I will.” She pulls the covers over her head.

  I pull them off. “When?”

  “As soon as I get some sleep. Jeez.” She yanks the blanket back and snuggles up in a fetal position. “You know, this bed smells funny. Did you even change the sheets?”

  I can’t take it anymore. I storm out of the room and slam the door behind me. How we ever lasted nine months sharing a womb I’ll never know. She’s so selfish. So pigheaded. So set in her ways and determined to find the worst in everyone. Mom should have named her Eeyore. Or simply “Bitch.”

  I head into the living room on my way to the kitchen. There, I find Stormy awake and sitting at the family computer, legs pulled up and under her and typing furiously on the keyboard. She stops when she hears me enter the room and throws me a cautious smile.

  “Oh phew, I thought for a moment you were the evil twin returning,” she says. Evidently my sister’s made an impression on the entire household, even though she’s only spent about five minutes here in total.

  “No, I’m the good twin,” I assure her. “The evil one’s lying asleep in your mom’s bed.”

  “Thank God.” Stormy turns back to her computer.

  “You know, Rayne’s not really evil,” I force myself to explain, even though I’m not feeling particularly generous toward my sister at the moment. “She just gets grumpy, that’s all. Especially when she’s tired.”

  Stormy nods, knowingly. “So does Crystal,” she says. “I know the deal. It’s too bad they don’t come with warning lights or something. Let us know when it’s unsafe to approach.”

  I laugh, taking a seat on the couch. “That would be awesome.” I peek over at the computer screen. “So what are you up to?” I ask. “Playing some early-morning video games?”

  She shakes her head. “Nah, just hacking into a small casino off the Strip to reprogram their slot machine payouts.”

  I raise my eyebrows. “You’re not serious.”

  “Sure am,” my sister replies, pride in her voice.

  “Trying to get rich quick or something?”

  “Oh no.” She laughs. “It’s not for me. I have everything I need already. But these casinos take advantage of a lot of poor and homeless people who gamble there. They promise them, like, riches and stuff, then just steal away their life savings with machines that are totally rigged.” She frowns at the computer screen. “So I’m just giving the gamblers a little home court advantage for once.”

  I stare at her, impressed. Eleven going on twenty-one? How about forty-three? “You’re like a regular twenty-first century Robin Hood,” I exclaim. “Robbing from the rich and giving to the poor.”

  “Something like that.” Stormy beams.

  “Aren’t you afraid of getting caught?”

  “Nah. I go through a ton of international proxy servers to hide my trail.”

  “You realize I have no clue what you just said.”

  She laughs. “No one ever does. But don’t worry, these places are already way corrupt. If they report a disturbance, they’ll get the gambling commission nosing around. And then they’d definitely have some explaining to do.”

  Okay, that logic I can understand. “Well, just don’t tell the evil twin you can do this. She’ll probably make you hack into the Bellagio or something to increase her odds.”

  “I don’t think she’s poor enough to need my help.”

  “She might be soon, at the rate she’s going.” I shake my head. “Anyway, how about those waffles?”

  Stormy turns to me, an excited look on her freckled face. Suddenly she’s eleven again. “Really?” she asks. “You really want to make some?”

  “Absolutely.”

  She leaps off her seat and dances to the kitchen. I join her there and soon we’re in major waffle-making mode, mixing the batter, heating up the iron, making a total mess. I accidentally drop an egg on my shoe, and she cracks up. Her laughter is infectious and soon we’re both giggling like crazy.

  “Let’s add chocolate chips!” she cries, pulling over a breakfast barstool to stand on so she can reach the high shelf. “I know Mom has some up here somewhere,” she adds as she starts rummaging through the cabinet.

  “Chocolate chips in waffles?” I say, raising an eyebrow. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

  “Gives them added yum,” Stormy explains confidently as she pulls the Toll House morsels from behind the bag of flour. Unfortunately in doing so, she manages to knock over the flour and a moment later I find myself completely covered head-to-toe in white powder. Stormy looks down at me, her expression hesitant. “Oops?” she says.

  “Oops?” I cry, grabbing her by the waist and yanking her down from the stool. She squeals in protest as I grab the Toll House bag away from her. “I’ll give you oops,” I tell her, tickling her and laughing so hard I can barely catch my breath. I grab a handful of chocolate chips and try to stu
ff them into her mouth. She screams as I roll her in the flour on the floor at my feet and wiggles free, retreating to the other side of the breakfast bar for cover.

  “What’s going on here?”

  We whirl around and realize that in the midst of our laughter we hadn’t heard Heather walk through the door, home from work. Yikes. I assess the kitchen, which is completely trashed by this point. Flour and chocolate chips strewn everywhere. She’s going to be so pissed. And I, as the almost adult and the guest in the home, am really the one to blame.

  “We’re making waffles, Mom!” Stormy announces cheerfully. “With chocolate chips for extra yum.”

  “And we had a little accident,” I start to explain. “But don’t worry—I’m totally going to clean—”

  “So who’s winning?” she interrupts.

  “Um, what?”

  “The food fight, of course.” She grins at both of us.

  “I think we’re about tied,” I manage to say, relief washing over me. I can’t believe she’s not mad.

  “No way. I’m kicking Sunny’s butt,” Stormy insists.

  “Mmm-hmm.” Heather rubs the top of her daughter’s head affectionately. “Sure you are.” She turns back to the kitchen. “Need some help?” she asks. “With the waffles, I mean, not the food fight.”

  I toss her a grateful smile. “Definitely.”

  Somehow, with Heather’s help, we’re eventually able to produce a few edible waffles out of the mess and sit down at the breakfast bar to eat them. I glance over at my sister, who’s stuffing waffle into her mouth, still unable to stop giggling. I reach over to brush a smudge of flour from her cheek, affectionately. It still feels weird to have a newfound sister and even more so to know where she came from. But at the end of the day she’s adorable and sweet and smart and really impossible to dislike. If only Rayne would give her half a chance.