Holidays Bite: A Limited Edition Collection of Holiday Vampire Tales

by Laura Greenwood

  When she is not writing, Chu enjoys hiking, cosplaying, sleeping, and scheming up new shenanigans. Chu currently resides in Louisville, KY with her husband and son, their three cats, and their two puppies.

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  In Possession

  A Vampiric Christmas Tale

  Margo Bond Collins and Sheena Austin

  About In Possession

  This Mr. Darcy isn’t the man she thought he was. In fact, he isn’t a man at all.

  When schoolteacher Lizzie Bennet Smith—yes, named after that Lizzie Bennet—agreed to accompany her best friend Delilah to Venice for the holidays, she didn’t really believe it would change her life.

  But she could dream, right?

  After all, there could be no more fitting place to find her own Fitzwilliam Darcy than on a trip to Europe, capped off by a traditional Venetian masquerade ball.

  At first, the whole trip seems like a dream come true.

  But that dream is about to turn into a nightmare.

  And when Lizzie realizes she’s the only one who can stop it—the nightmare only grows more horrifying.

  It’s not pride or prejudice interfering with her dreams. It’s sheer terror.

  Chapter 1

  I spun around, throwing my arms up to the night sky. “I can’t believe you actually brought us to Venice for Christmas.”

  Delilah laughed as I stumbled in my high heels on the cobblestone-paved street. “If you’re not careful, you’ll fall into the canal.”

  I ignored Delilah’s warning, though. “It’s just so beautiful.”

  “It’s like the whole city is just full of history,” Delilah said.

  “It’s like it’s made of history.” I meant it, too. All around us, buildings rose up along the sides of the canal as if they grew from the water itself. Bridges arched over the canals, connecting walkways that wound between the buildings like alleyways.

  I loved it that no cars were allowed in Venice. It was a city of walkers, ancient and rocky and beautiful, like a multifaceted jewel set in a maze of waterways.

  It distracted me beautifully from the fact that I was still jet-lagged and hungry.

  Not Delilah, though. “What are we going to eat?”

  I shrugged. “Anyplace would be fine with me. What does the guidebook suggest?”

  “You have the guidebook.”

  I glanced down at the coat I wore over my skin-tight dress, heels, and tiny clutch purse. “Where am I supposed to be hiding it?”

  “Maybe your coat pocket?”

  I knew it wasn’t there, but I checked anyway, pulling out my phone instead. “Well, thank goodness for modern technology.” I began to search for nearby restaurants.

  “See if you can find where the best places are.” As if I needed instructions on how to use the internet.

  “All I care about is finding food. I’m not sure we can expect anything more the very first night in Venice, right?” Truth be told, I would’ve been just as happy to have room service delivered to our hotel suite.

  And then we could topple over and sleep until the next morning. The flight and customs and getting to our hotel had taken even longer than I had expected.

  “I’m starving,” Delilah said. “I want something amazing for our first night here.”

  I shook my head. “Everything I’m finding looks okay. We probably should have decided where we were going before we left the room. That way we could have checked these against the travel guide.”

  “We could be doing that now if you hadn’t forgotten the guidebook,” Delilah muttered.

  I pretended not to hear her. “Here’s one,” I read aloud from a site. “It says Café Fiore is charming and serves real Italian food. And as an extra bonus, they often have a local fortune-teller or Venetian bands playing.”

  “I don’t want to go listen to some band blaring music in my ear while I try to eat,” Delilah said.

  I bit my lip, not wanting to upset my friend, but also not wanting to spend much more time searching. The café was only a couple blocks away—and I was getting hungry, too. But I couldn’t hold it in. “If you’re going to be cranky tonight, why exactly did you drag me out tonight? I’m not exactly over my jet lag yet.”

  “Because we’re in Venice. It’d be a crime to stay in our hotel room tonight,” Delilah said sternly.

  I let out a long sigh. “So, it’s not bad enough that you drag me across the world but now you’re making me feel guilty?”

  Great. This was turning into a full-fledged argument.

  Delilah rolled her eyes. “It’s not like you had anything else better to do–or a family to celebrate Christmas with.”

  I’d been looking up at one of the buildings rising above, but now I twisted around to face Delilah. Slitting my eyes, I gave my friend a death stare. “That doesn’t exactly win you brownie points. That was way harsh and uncalled for.”

  Delilah glanced over and smiled apologetically. “I’m sorry, Lizzie. I really do want to see you happy and I thought you’d enjoy having an adventure. What better way to spend a night?”

  I relaxed a little. I knew Delilah had my best interests at heart, but I would much rather be sleeping in a comfortable bed at our hotel.

  “Let’s go to the café, then?”

  At Delilah’s nod, I started down the street, wrapping my coat around me. Ahead of us, a group of masked figures in formal wear crossed in front of us. I considered the black sequined cocktail dress I was wearing in comparison to the beautiful costumes.

  “I feel a bit out of place. I look like a streetwalker.”

  Delilah threw her head back in laughter. “If you’re a streetwalker, then that must make me your pimp.”

  Letting out a groan, I shook my head. “I think I’d get better treatment from a pimp.”

  Delilah stopped in the middle of the street. “Whoa. Now who’s being way harsh and uncalled for? Better treatment than what you’re getting now?”

  “I was only joking. I’m sorry. Let’s go eat—I think we’ll feel better afterward.”

  Biting her lip, Delilah nodded. “You’re right.”

  “We should go eat and get our fortunes told,” I suggested brightly.

  “Okay, fine.” Delilah took a deep breath and the two of us headed toward the café.

  Chapter 2

  About a block from the turn we had to make to go over the canal, a group of young women about our own age stumbled around the corner.

  There were five girls, all dressed in similar to ours—clearly a group of girls out on the town.

  As they grew closer, their conversation grew audible. They spoke in English.

  “We should never have gone,” one of the women said in a strident New York accent.

  “Oh, come on. It was entertaining,” a young blonde replied.

  A third girl said in English heavily accented by Italian, “I told you it was not a good idea. The fortune-teller there is absolutely—how do you say it? Real. True.”

  “Authentic?” I suggested as we walked past the other group.

  “Yes. That is it. Authentic.”

  “So where’s the party?” Delilah asked.

  The blonde woman replied. “Oh, there’s no party, we just saw a fortune-teller.”

  “We’re making jokes about how our lives are doomed at
a masquerade ball tonight,” a brunette added.

  Delilah’s eyes lit up with amusement. “That’s dreadful. Where is this fortune-teller?”

  “She is sitting outside of Café Fiore,” the blonde replied.

  “Do not go to her. Go elsewhere. This one, she is crazy.” The redhead with the accent grabbed my arm and squeezed it.

  That’s fear in her eyes.

  “I’m sure it’s some hoax,” I reassured her.

  “Ladies, go, enjoy. Ignore Andrea. She’s a party pooper and can’t take a joke.” The blonde woman shook her head.

  The one with the New York accent spoke again. “Andrea, would you like to go back to the hotel with me? I don’t want to go to the ball, either.”

  “Yes. Please.” The two of them linked arms.

  “We’ll see you tomorrow,” the New Yorker said to the rest. “If you survive.” Together, they stalked away.

  The remaining three women laughed, and I shook my head in amusement.

  “Well. Looks like we have two extra masquerade ball tickets now,” the blonde said. “Would you like them?”

  A shiver went up my spine, but before I could say anything, Delilah was accepting the tickets. “Sure. We’ll be there.”

  She took the tickets and tucked them into her own purse.

  “Perhaps we’ll see you at the masquerade later?” the blonde asked. “I’m Jane, this is Kate, and that’s Mary.”

  Delilah smiled and introduced us. “Nice to meet you.”

  I tugged on Delilah’s arm. “We’ve got to get dinner first, though. Have a great evening, and we’ll see you later.”

  “See you tonight,” Jane called out cheerfully

  As they moved off in another direction, I pointed us to the café. “If we go to the restaurant right now, we should have plenty of time to make it to the ball. Even in these hellacious heels.”

  “I want to see this fortune-teller they were talking about.” Delilah grinned and waved to the remainder of the group as they disappeared around a corner.

  I chewed my bottom lip. “Are you sure you want to go see a scary fortune-teller?”

  “You know that stuff is all crap. I’m sure one of the girls told her they were going to the masquerade ball, and the old witch made up a lot of creepy, scary predictions just to worry them.”

  “Doesn’t seem like much of a money-making strategy,” I observed.

  Delilah laughed out loud. “I don’t know. Don’t people want chills and thrills when they go to a fortune-teller? Isn’t that what she gets tips for? Scaring the shit out of other people?”

  “Fine,” I finally conceded. “Let’s go see what we can figure out about Venetian fortune-tellers.”

  But as we moved down the road toward the café, a chill crawled up along my spine. It was all well and good to make fun of the fortune-teller. What if she really had some kind of power?

  As we moved into one of the cross streets, a group of people wearing traditional painted Carnival masks and ornate formalwear from another century swirled up around us and enveloped us.

  For a few seconds, it was like dancing in the midst of an old Venetian ballroom crowd.

  Lace and brocade and silk and satin and velvet swished and whirled around us, and I spun around, dizzy and disoriented.

  “Where did you go?” Delilah demanded as the costumed dancers swirled back down the road and out of sight.

  “I wasn’t—I couldn’t—for a minute it was like…” I gave up trying to explain the dizziness that had enveloped me and simply shook my head.

  “Well. Whatever it was, it’s making us late. Get a move on, girlfriend.”

  As we moved toward the café, I couldn’t shake my unease. “We’re not really going to a masquerade where we could die.”

  “Yes, we are. And we’re not going to die.”

  From outside, the café was exactly as described—charming and small. The windows glowed with a warm golden light from within.

  “Let’s eat first, okay?” I said.

  “Sure. Then we can get our fortunes told.”

  “She’s probably gone. After all, it’s getting late. Let’s just eat.”

  “I agree with your friend,” a voice interrupted us.

  We turned to face a small, elderly woman sitting at the only occupied outdoor table, just beside the door.

  “Pardon me?” I asked, not quite sure what was going on.

  “I agree with your friend that you should talk to me,” the woman responded.

  Chapter 3

  “It looks like our fortune-teller found us,” Delilah’s eyes lit up and she smiled a big, toothy grin. “It’s like she’s psychic or something.”

  I rolled my eyes at how ridiculous Delilah sounded.

  The old woman cackled. “I am, dearie.”

  “How did you know we were looking for you?” I decided to play along.

  The woman took me by the hand. “You called for me and I followed.”

  “Excuse me? I didn’t call for anybody.”

  The woman looked deep into my eyes, which sent a shiver down her spine. “Sit and I shall tell your fortune.”

  “Wait for me,” Delilah said. “I’m going to go in and grab a bottle of wine.”

  By the time she returned with a bottle and three glasses, the fortune-teller had shuffled through a deck of cards and begun turning them over one by one.

  The old woman’s hands were gnarled, the joints knotty and twisted. She tapped on the cards, their ornate figures inscrutable to me. “You have been fated,” she said.

  “Fated for what?” I cast a nervous glance at Delilah, who snickered.

  “Fated to kill the dark.”

  Kill the dark? What the hell was that?

  “I don’t have any intention of killing anyone.”

  “Oh, but you must.”

  “You must dance with the masked man who wears no masks.” The old woman turned her face up toward me, and she smiled as she tapped the final card. “And if you prevail, you will save us all.”

  “How can I possibly know who the masked man is if he doesn’t wear a mask?” I took a big swig of wine, deciding drunk was the only way to deal with this.

  “The cards don’t lie, child. When the time is nigh, you shall know. Make your own weapon using what’s at hand. That’s the moment when you will know all that say is true.

  Yeah, right. “I’ll keep an eye out for that, then.”

  “My turn.” Delilah, who had been chugging wine steadily, dragged one of the bistro chairs to the fortune-teller’s table and dropped it next to mine. Plopping down in it, Delilah leaned forward, putting her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands. “What’s my fortune?”

  The old woman shrugged and scooped up the cards. Shuffling them in her hands, she continued to stare at me, her eyes boring into me for a minute solid, it felt like. “It’s true,” she insisted. “You have a destiny. You will learn that very soon. Whatever you do, don’t return to the life you knew. If you do, you’ll only hurt the small ones you need to protect.”

  Small ones? Did this old woman know what I did?

  “See? I told you that going into teaching as a career was a terrible idea.”

  I cast a narrow glance at Delilah from the corner of my eye. Did Delilah have no idea what this old witch was saying?

  No, I decided as Delilah poured herself yet another drink from the wine carafe in front of us. Delilah wasn’t noticing much at all right now.

  “Got it,” I said to the fortune-teller. Not that I believed in any of it, but I was willing to humor the old lady if it meant she would stop talking about my destiny.

  The old woman gazed at me for a long moment, then turned her attention to Delilah. She shuffled the cards and had Delilah draw several.

  The old woman laid them on the table, flipping them down and murmuring over them. “You will attend a magical gathering.”

  Delilah squealed at the old woman’s words.

  “It will turn dark. You must light the wa
y for others in order to escape the darkness.”

  Delilah leaned over toward me and stage-whispered, “Maybe I’m going to some sex party. I’ll have to lead some guys out.”

  I couldn’t help but snort at my friend’s overactive imagination. “Obviously.”

  The old woman frowned. “But in this, you should be as a bridesmaid to a bride.”

  “What does that mean? I never get married?”

  “I think it’s a metaphor,” I suggested.

  “Your job shall be as helpmeet to she who was chosen.”

  “So, like a sidekick?” Delilah snickered.

  “I think you got a little too toasty,” I said.

  The old woman was already nodding. “Yes. As you say. A sidekick.”

  “Ah, man. I don’t want be Robin. I want to be Batman.” Delilah turned her wavering gaze to me, but I had already stood and was rifling through my purse for euros to pay the woman.

  “I’m a sidekick, and that means your Batman.”

  “Yeah, yeah. Whatever. I’m Batman. Come on, let’s go get some food in both of us.”

  I placed the money on the table and nodded politely to the old woman. “Thank you, ma’am. I’m taking my friend inside now.”

  The old woman grabbed my hand. “You must kill their leader and drain him of his strength in order to power your new vocation.”

  Blood drained from my face and adrenaline thrummed in my ears.

  What the fuck is she talking about? She’s batshit crazy.

  Tugging my hand away from the woman only caused the old lady to grip it tighter.

  “I’m not crazy, Lizzie Bennet Smith.”

  How the hell did she know my name?

  My eyes darted around to see if there were any police officers nearby. This woman was definitely delusional and off her meds.

  Delilah chimed in. “Wow, we were kind of hoping for Lizzie to find her dream man at the masquerade ball tonight and that I would find a millionaire or something.”