The Hunger

by Dandridge Doug

  The late afternoon sun stung his eyes as he walked from the building. He waved his hand and the car pulled off of the curb down the street and headed his way. He opened the back door and slid into the seat. Tashawn turned around and gave him a predatory smile.

  “Any luck?” the big man asked. “You find the whore?”

  “I think I’ve found her,” answered Marcus, patting the big man on the shoulder. “And I’ve arranged for the delivery of dinner as well.”

  “Marvin,” he said to the driver in his commanding voice. “We have a couple of hours to kill. Why don’t you drive us to another place where the scum hangs out. We might learn something interesting.”

  Marvin nodded his head as he pulled away from the curb.

  “Hey,” said Tashawn. “He’s my friend. So you don’t need to do that mind control crap on him.”

  “Mortals are never our friends,” said Marcus, staring into Tashawn’s eyes. “They can be our servants, or our food. But never our friends. Remember that vampire, or you will come to regret it.”

  * * *

  Monsignor O’Connor woke when the alarm clock went off hours before sunset, not feeling particularly rested.

  What did you think at your age? That you could stay up all night and a few hours in the day would make you feel fresh as a puppy. O’Connor staggered into the small bathroom attached to the guest room and splashed some cold water on his face. He studied his visage in the mirror and grunted. You look like hell. You’re going to kill yourself if you keep going like this.

  O’Connor said a quick prayer in his head, asking God to just keep him going long enough to fulfill his mission. But he also knew that God helped those who helped themselves, and taking care of himself was the best way to make sure he kept going long enough.

  O’Connor took a shower, reveling in the feel of the hot water flowing over his skin. He toweled off and climbed into a set of black clothing, making sure that he looked the part of the priest in this Godless house. Then he went to the door and put his ear against the hollow core barrier.

  “Sounds like he’s up,” said a rough voice outside the door.

  “How’d you come up with that deduction, Sherlock,” said a deeper voice. “He could of woken the whole house if anyone had been asleep.”

  “A fuckin priest,” said the first voice. “What’ll the boss want next, a damn Voodoo Witch Doctor?”

  “Don’t you get sacrilegious on me,” said the second voice. “You show some respect for the good Padre, or I’ll have to beat some respect into you.”

  “I didn’t mean nothing by it Manny,” said the first voice. “Boss tells me to bow down to the bastard, I’ll bow down. He tells me to cut his throat…”

  O’Connor shuddered as he pulled away from the door. A Godless house indeed, he thought. Maybe I should let her do her work, then come after her. At least this pack of scum would not be a bother to this town. But then another would just rise in its place. And at least they’re human.

  O’Connor fumbled with the door knob for a moment, making sure that the men in the hall knew he was coming out, and hoping they didn’t think he had overheard them. As he walked through the door the man named Manny, a big brute of a man who looked like a steroid freak, turned and gave him a shark like smile.

  “Like something to eat, Padre?” he asked. “Mr. Padillas told us to take care of your every need.”

  “I’d like some coffee,” said O’Connor. And he probably told you to keep a constant eye on me as well. So I don’t stumble onto something I shouldn’t.

  “Right this way, Padre,” said Manny, leading the way down the long hall, the other man, his crazy eyes looking this way and that, falling in at O’Connor’s back.

  O’Connor took in the good paintings on the wall as he followed the big man. They walked through a doorway and into the large kitchen, where a Latina woman was stirring a pot while something that smelled delicious cooked in the large oven.

  “Cream and sugar, Padre,” said Manny, pulling a large cup from a cupboard and putting it on the counter next to a large brewing machine.

  “Cream will be fine,” said O’Connor. “And some sweetener if you have it. Sugar’s not good for me.”

  “Diabetic, Padre?” asked the crazy little guy with the rough voice. O’Connor nodded. “That sucks. My dad had diabetes and it was a bitch.”

  “How is your father now?” asked O’Connor, accepting the cup from Manny and taking a sip. He nodded in appreciation at the very good coffee he had been given.

  “Dad’s not doing so well,” said the little guy. “He had an accident when I was in high school.”

  O’Connor shuddered to think what kind of accident dear old dad had with the little psychopath in the family.

  “Vinny is pulling your chain, Padre,” said the big man. “What kind of priest are you anyway?”

  “I’m a Jesuit,” said O’Connor, taking another sip of coffee and feeling the wonderful caffeine entering his system.

  “An educated priest, huh?”

  “PhD in Clinical Psychology,” answered O’Connor. “BS in Psychology and Biology.”

  “So what made you want to be a vampire hunter?” asked Vinny with a chuckle.

  “God, Vinny,” said the bigger man. “Excuse the little shit Padre.”

  “That’s OK, Manny,” said John O’Connor with a smile. “I didn’t choose to be a vampire hunter, Vinny. I was called to it by the Lord.”

  “Whatever you say, Father,” said Vinny, shaking his head.

  Just as I was called by the Lord to enter a den of vipers, he thought. And protect them from the Devil that will claim them in the end no matter what I do.

  * * *

  Lucinda felt that her time spent in the public records section of City Hall was fruitful, if not as enlightening as she had hoped. The Padillas Empire stretched throughout Hillsborough, Pinellas, Polk and Pasco Counties. At least the legitimate aspects of the empire. She had a pretty good rundown of what properties he owned, business and residential, and what bolt holes he might use if he felt threatened.

  Some of the other aspects of his life might require a little more in the way of interrogation. But she was sure that she would get the information, one way or another. It would have been nice if she had been able to get to Padillas the night before. Then she could have been out of this town and on her way to another trouble spot. Now she could see no way to get into his house. Not with everyone in the town alerted and looking for her. She didn’t think she could talk her way into the house, which meant she had to get Padillas when he was out of the house.

  After stopping at an ATM to get some money out of her account she had gone by a medical supply store near Tampa General to pick up some scrubs. Waiting for the taxi to come, ensuring that she had gotten the same driver that would let her sit up front, she thought again about the benefits of having a car of her own. But that would entail getting a driver’s license, or a fake, which came with problems of its own, like what to do if a cop ran it. And a car could also cause other problems if she left it in a place where it was found after a killing.

  Now Lucinda spent some time getting into her stalking clothes, making herself up to look like a streetwalker. She worried for a moment that the heat might be too great on the street. That the dealers and pimps might be spending the evening in hiding, knowing that death stalked the night. A smile crossed her face at that thought. The pimps and dealers were for the most part greedy and stupid. They would stay on the streets selling their wares if Satan himself were walking by.

  The sun was still up when she left the house, feeling like Superman, with her whore’s clothing worn under her new scrubs, her heels in the large bag hanging from her shoulder. She walked away from the house and down the street, to the City Transit stop and the bus that would take her back to one of the high crime areas of the city.

  * * *

  O’Connor thought for a moment that he had been transported into a bad gangster movie. Big, beefy men surrounded him
wherever he went on the estate. Men with names like Vinnie, Rocko and Mannie. He had asked one of them about it while he was working on his special project.

  “My real name’s Fred Sander,” said the big man with the arms of a body builder. “But the boss likes to think of himself like the Godfather. You know, like that movie. So we all got Italian nicknames.”

  “Even though you’re not Italian?” asked the priest, taking the paint and brushes the man had brought him.

  “Hell,” laughed Fred Rocko Sander. “The boss, he ain't even Italian. His parents came from Greece. His dad was a sponge diver while the boss was growing up.”

  O’Connor shook his head as he carried the paint into the room he had chosen, Fred following him like a very large shadow. O’Connor put the paint on the top of a drop cloth and started working on the lid with the little opening tool that was sent with the can. The top came off as easy as such things ever did, meaning with great difficulty. O’Connor started stirring the paint with the wooden stick that came with the paint, while Fred sat on the floor and pulled out a book. O’Connor grunted in surprise when he saw the title.

  “Yeah,” said Fred, looking at the cover himself. “Mark Twain is my favorite. Not all of us here are illiterate goons, even though we were hired for our strength of limb, so to speak. But the boss likes his bodyguards to have something in the head as well.”

  “I noticed that there are no blacks or Latinos here,” said O’Connor, stirring away at the paint. He stopped for a moment to crumble some white wafers into the paint, then continued to stir.

  “The boss will use the niggers and the spics,” said Fred, his easy speech showing that he didn’t think there was anything wrong with the labels. “But he says that he won’t trust his life to them.”

  It tells much of him, thought O’Connor, that he needs many men to guard his life in the first place. After crumbling some more wafer in the paint and stirring for a while longer, O’Connor looked at his mixture with satisfaction. He tore the brush from its wrapping plastic and dipped it into the paint. Pulling the sopping brush from the can he started to work on one of the walls while Fred looked on.

  “You really think this is going to work?” asked Fred, his brow furrowing as he watched the priest at work.

  “I don’t see why not,” said the priest. “I’ve never tried this before, but I see no reason that it wouldn’t.”

  “Why not just stake her when she shows up?” asked Fred. “That’s what Buffee does after all.”

  “She isn’t like a vampire that you see on TV or in the movies,” said O’Connor, shaking his head. No wonder they are able to move around us so easy, when most people are completely clueless about their true powers.

  “So staking her don’t work?”

  “Staking her works just fine, Fred,” said the priest. “In the daytime it works quite fine. But at night they are very hard to harm, much less kill.”

  “So they’re invulnerable at night?” asked Fred.

  “No,” said the priest. “They are definitely not invulnerable. But they are extremely hard to handle. I’ve heard of vampires being destroyed at night as well. Which is one reason I wish you would have let me keep my gun.”

  “The boss don’t want anyone he hasn’t known for quite a while to carry heat around him,” said Fred. “Nothing personal, you understand.”

  “The only thing I want is to rid the Earth of this monster,” said the priest. “I mean none of the living any harm.”

  “It’s up to the boss,” said Fred. “If he says give you back your piece, we give it back to you. If not, then you depend on us to watch your back. Besides, the boss has your gun on his person. If it needs to be used, he can use it.”

  O’Connor snorted at the obstinacy of the people he was forced to work with. But they were his best chance of getting to her, so they were the tools he needed to use. The priest continued to paint on one wall, then dragged the drop cloth and paint bucket to another. When finished with that wall he was feeling a little light headed from the fumes.

  “I need some air,” he told Fred. “Could we go out for a moment?”

  “Sure,” agreed Fred. “The boss is entertaining some people out in the back yard, and I don’t think he wants you to listen in. But the front porch is free. Just make sure you don’t get out of my sight.”

  The way the man looked at him O’Connor was sure there would be real trouble if he got out of the sight of his watchers. Therefore he had no intention of getting out of sight or trying to be secretive in his preparations. Yet.

  * * *

  Jane Martin pulled her car against the curb and got out, walking jauntily toward the front door as Marcus came out of the passenger door and followed. The woman was moving her hips in a sexy manner. Marcus smiled. He knew he had that effect on women, and had used it to advantage against her.

  Marcus looked around as he followed up the walkway. He could see Marvin’s car parked up the street. Then his attention was brought back to the real estate agent as she started knocking on the door.

  Wait till I signal for you, he thought. An answering ascent came into his mind, as Tashawn, hiding in the bushes at the side of the house, thought back at him.

  “I don’t think she’s home,” said the agent. “Too bad she doesn’t have a phone. We could have saved a trip out here.”

  “That’s OK,” said Marcus, staring into the woman’s eyes. “Could we have a look inside?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Jane Martin, shaking her head. “I don’t intrude on the lives of the tenants. It’s nosey and it’s against the law. But now that you know where the place is at you can come back anytime you want.”

  Marcus stared into the woman’s blue green eyes, probing deep into her soul. He could feel her will fleeing before his, as a blank look came over her face.

  “You will open the door for me,” he said in a calm voice.

  “Why don’t I just let you in,” said Jane, pulling a set of keys from her purse, selecting the right one, and sliding it into the deadbolt lock.

  “I’m sure she won’t mind if we go inside,” continued Jane as she opened the lower handle lock, then turned the handle and pushed the knob in.

  Marcus could smell the faint scent of his kind in the air coming from the house. He gestured the woman in before him as he made ready to enter the house. Now will be the test, he thought. If it was the home of a living person he would not be able to cross the threshold without the invitation of the resident, and he would not be able to follow Jane Martin into the house. But if it were the dwelling of the already dead.

  Marcus crossed the threshold easily, feeling no resistance whatsoever. The scent was slightly stronger inside, but still not strong enough to alert him to the presence of a vampire. She is not here, he thought. Did that mean that she was out for the night? Or that this was a secondary lair, one she had set up but not used.

  “What are we doing in here?” said Jane Martin, coming somewhat out of her trance.

  You may come, Tashawn, thought Marcus to the lesser vampire. He felt no need to feed himself this night, but knew that a youngling like Tashawn would soon be feeling the hunger. And he didn’t want the youngling’s instincts working against him this night.

  “You opened the door and let us in,” said Marcus to the woman, as she looked at the key she was holding in her thumb and forefinger like she had never seen it before.

  “Why would I do that?” she asked, shaking her head as if to clear it. “I could lose my license for breaking into this house.”

  The door opened behind Marcus and Jane hissed in a breath. Marcus looked back at Tashawn. He is an intimidating sight, thought Marcus. Even as a mortal he must have been intimidating.

  Tashawn stretched to his full six-foot five-inch height as he flexed his massive arm muscles. His eyes locked with those of the woman, driving the will from her with the force of his personality.

  He learns quickly, thought Marcus. Quickly enough? We will see.

  “
Are you hungry, Tashawn?” Marcus asked of the towering giant.

  “Just a little, Master,” said Tashawn, showing a canine dominant smile.

  “You will be ravenous in a little while,” said Marcus, looking at the woman. “You may feed.”

  Tashawn nodded as he moved forward, keeping the woman locked into his eyes. He raised his hands, reaching for the woman. At that moment Jane Martin must have felt the total threat to her existence that the man represented. She opened her mouth to scream. Tashawn’s hands shot forward, one grasping the woman’s left shoulder while the other went over her mouth, stifling the nascent scream.

  Jane tried to fight away as Tashawn brought his mouth toward the right side of her neck. She swung her hands to his face, then tried to push him away. The sun was not yet down and Tashawn had yet to gain his supernatural strength. But for a man who weighed two hundred and seventy pounds and had bench pressed over five hundred when he had been alive, the struggles of a woman of average strength were nothing.

  Tashawn pierced the neck with his fangs, ripping into the flesh. The woman bit his hand, her eyes wide with fear. Tashawn ignored the pinprick of the bite and started sucking the fluid that gushed from the wound in the neck.

  Marcus could see the pure pleasure in Tashawn’s eyes as the big vampire drained the life force from the woman. Jane Martin’s struggles became weaker and weaker, her eyes shown with a pleasure matching that of her slayer. Then she was not struggling at all as her body no longer had enough blood for the heart to pump. With a final couple of sucks at the neck, Tashawn brought his head away from the woman. There was blood trickling down the vampire’s lips and dribbling off of his chin.

  Tashawn dropped the body of the woman. It fell limply to the floor, the head that would never feel again cracking on the hardwood floor. The corpse sprawled like a rag doll, wide eyes staring at nothing.

  “Clean up your mess, Tashawn,” ordered Marcus, nodding at the body. Tashawn looked blankly for a moment at the older vampire, still in the throes of the ecstasy of feeding.