She tried to move her hand and found that she could. She patted herself, and realized she was a terrible mess. And there was someone in this dark place with her. Someone else who wasn’t breathing.
Someone else… who wasn’t breathing.
She opened her mouth to scream.
“Don’t, darling.”
Sean.
“We’re…I’m…”
“It was the only way to save your life.”
“I remember now.” She began shivering all over, and Sean’s arms surrounded her. He kissed her on the forehead, then on the mouth. She could feel his touch as she’d never felt anyone’s touch before. She could feel the texture of his skin, hear the minute sound of the cloth moving over his body. The smell of him was a sharp arousal. When his mouth fell on hers, she was ready.
“Turn on your side, angel,” Sean said raggedly, and she maneuvered to face him. Together, they worked down her panty hose, and then he was in her, and she made a noise of sheer pleasure. Nothing had ever felt so good. He was rougher with her, and she knew it was because she was as he was, now, and his strength would not hurt her. Her climax was shattering in its intensity. When it was over, she felt curiously exhausted. She was, she discovered, very hungry.
She said, “When can we get out?”
“They’ll come lift the lid soon,” he said. “I could do it myself, but I’m afraid I’d push it off too hard and break it. We don’t want anyone to know we were here.”
In a few minutes, she heard the scrape of the heavy lid being moved to one side, and a dim light showed her Rick and Phil standing above them, holding the heavy stone lid at each end.
Other hands reached down, and Julie and Thompson helped them out of the sarcophagus.
“How is it?” Julie asked shyly, when she and Rue were alone in the women’s bathroom. The men were cleaning up all traces of their occupancy of the sarcophagus, and Rue had decided she just had to wash her face and rinse out her mouth. She might as well have spared the effort, she decided, evaluating her image in the mirror—delighted she could see herself, despite the old myth. Her clothes were torn, bloody and crumpled. At least Julie had kindly loaned her a brush.
“Being this way?”
Julie nodded. “Is it really that different?”
“Oh, yes,” Rue said. In fact, it was a little hard to concentrate, with Julie’s heart beating so near her. This was going to take some coping; she needed a bottle of TrueBlood, and she needed it badly.
“The police want to talk to you,” Julie said. “A detective named Wallingford.”
“Lead me to him,” Rue said. “But I’d better have a drink first.”
It wasn’t often a murder victim got to accuse her attacker in person. Rue’s arrival at the police station in her bloodstained dress was a sensation. Despite his broken arm, Carver Hutton IV was paraded in the next room in a lineup, with stand-ins bandaged to match him, and she enjoyed picking him from the group.
Then Sean did the same.
Then Mustafa.
Then Abilene.
Three vampires and a human sex performer were not the kind of witnesses the police relished, but several museum patrons had seen the attack clearly, among them Rue’s old dance partner, John Jaslow.
“There’ll be a trial, of course,” Detective Wallingford told her. He was a dour man in his forties, who looked as though he’d never laughed. “But with his past history with you, and his fingerprints on the knife, and all the eyewitness testimony, we shouldn’t have too much trouble getting a conviction. We’re not in his daddy’s backyard this time.”
“I had to die to get justice,” she said. There was a moment of silence in the room.
Julie said. “We’ll go over to my place so you two can shower, and then we can go dancing. It’s a new life, Rue!”
She took Sean’s hand. “Layla,” she said gently. “My name is Layla.”
Layla Steps Up
Layla Steps Up
The music was an eerie solo on a South American pipe, sinuous and curling back on itself, the same way that the two dancers entwined. Sean O’Rourke and Layla LeMay never got farther apart than an arm’s length, never lost contact. His arm wound around hers, her leg wrapped around him while her arms arced backward, and then she climbed up his body, ending with her waist gripped by Sean, her legs straight up in the air. After holding this torturous pose for a long moment, Layla swung downward to land in front of Sean, her back to him. He wrapped both his arms around her, her hands covered his, and his lips grazed her neck. The music came to a stop on a quavering note.
Although this was only a practice session for the Valentine’s Day exhibition, “Love, Sex, and the Dance,” there were a few patrons and dancers sitting in the auditorium. There was a smattering of applause.
Layla lay back against Sean with her eyes closed for a few seconds and then she stepped away, switching her grip to hold his hand and stand beside him while they took a bow and left the stage.
Layla was very pleased. The sinuous duet was by far the most demanding routine they’d ever done. It beat doing a two-step at a charity ball, for sure.
“My woman,” Sean said, giving her a kiss.
“My man.” She put her hand on his cold cheek.
The partners were the only vampire team working for Blue Moon Entertainment. The other dance teams were all vampire/human, as Sean and Layla had been a year ago.
Backstage, Sylvia Dayton, the human owner of Blue Moon, gave them a thumbs-up. Sean nodded, and Layla sketched a curtsy.
“That’s totally appropriate for the exhibition,” Sylvia said in a low voice, when Thompson and Julie’s music came on. The two dancers now on stage presented a distinct contrast: Thompson’s mother had been Polynesian, and he had remained a golden color after his first death. Julie was blonde, and warm-blooded.
The tango music made Layla sway, and she watched the couple dance for a minute or two. When Layla noticed Sean was ready to go, she smiled apologetically and they returned to the dressing room to put on their street clothes.
“Time to call a donor,” Sean said as he zipped up his pants. “You must be hungry.” Layla had met her first death only a year before, and she had to eat more frequently than Sean, who was working on his third century.
“Shall I get two?” Layla pulled her phone from her purse. The volunteer donors’ bureau in Rhodes had a long list of humans who would give blood to vampires for a nominal sum. In return, the vamps would make the experience very pleasant. The contract each client vampire signed with the bureau stated the parameters of the transaction very clearly.
“I suppose so,” Sean said. He was pulling on his boots.
Layla paused with her finger over the speed dial number. “What’s the matter?” she asked. Sean was her maker, and though she knew him better than anyone else, she could not always be sure what he was thinking. But she knew he was not excited, or even pleasantly anticipatory.
“It still seems unnatural to order up blood instead of hunt for it,” he said, his Irish accent making everything sing in Layla’s ears. “And it makes life almost too easy.”
What he left unspoken was his very different experience during his first year as a vampire. Layla had never experienced the necessity of sticking to the shadows, attacking the unwary, fearing exposure with every feeding, constantly looking for a safe place to sleep for the day.
Sean had only described it as frightening. It had never occurred to her that he believed she had missed something.
“Isn’t this better for everyone?” Layla asked. Her hand gripped the phone so tightly that she realized she might crush it. She often forgot how strong she was now.
“I’m sure it is,” Sean said, without conviction.
“You want to go hunting old-style? That would be stimulating for you?” She felt as if a dark pit had opened under her feet. For the past year, while she had adjusted to being dead, Layla had thought she and Sean had been perfectly happy.
“Darling, I would no
t endanger you,” Sean said. “If I were caught taking from someone unwilling, if I killed someone, the consequences to you would be too harsh.”
“They would? Why?” Layla heard an edge in her voice, and she knew her eyes had narrowed. For the past few weeks, she’d had the uneasy suspicion there was a lot she didn’t know about her altered state. Yet she’d been content enough, and she hadn’t worried about it. Until now.
“You would be left alone.” Sean had his back to her as he buttoned his coat. Layla wished she could have read his face when he said that.
You would be left alone. Layla chewed that over as they left the auditorium. Obviously, she’d be alone if something happened to Sean. But she detected an implication to his words, a nuance beyond the obvious. Layla wondered what he was really telling her.
Sean had turned her to save her life. A stalker who’d been pursuing Layla had finally had a chance to strike at her. Luckily for Layla, he’d attacked her in a public place with plenty of witnesses, and they’d pulled him away in time to save her life … barely. Sean had determined that her blood loss was probably fatal, so he had turned her. They’d been a couple before her death; Layla looked forward to being a couple for hundreds of years.
But as the two walked silently together in the direction of their apartment, Layla mulled over her sense of unease. It appeared that her assumption that life—well, death—was perfect, wasn’t shared by Sean. But she didn’t know what to do about it.
Rubio, the doorman at the vampire-owned apartment building, greeted them by name. He was a vampire himself, of course. During the day, armed humans stood guard. Sean and Layla paid for the extra security, and it gave them peace.
Thirty minutes after after Sean and Layla unlocked their apartment door, Rubio called to tell them the donors had arrived. Part of Rubio’s job was to check the donors’ credentials, and he’d never neglected to be sure they were legitimate. When the knock came at the door, Sean answered it. Layla, brushing her just-washed hair in front of the bedroom mirror, heard Sean say, “Good evening.” She came into the living room as he was extending his hand to the female donor.
Usually, if a couple turned up, she would take the woman and Sean would take the man. Not tonight. Layla felt another frisson as Sean talked to the woman, but she was hungry enough to ignore it for the moment.
The male donor’s eyes widened when he saw her. He clearly felt he’d hit the jackpot. Layla knew she was beautiful; people had been telling her so since she was a teenager. Layla’s skin was not yet the bleached white of the older vampires, her hair was a rich mahogany that fell below her shoulder blades, and her eyes were almost the same color as her hair. Her features were absolutely symmetrical.
Groomed by her driven mother, Layla had competed in beauty pageants for all of her short human life, and she’d earned a college scholarship that she’d never gotten to use. But her beauty had also nearly been the death of her – in a way, it had been the death of her -- and Layla never forgot that.
The donor introduced himself as Calvin. He had to be at least twenty-one to qualify for the program, but he looked younger. Calvin might have a good job, but his geeky looks endeared him to Layla, who had been a college student when she died.
The least I can offer him is some enthusiasm. Layla smiled brilliantly as she drew him closer. She tried to keep her eyes focused on his face so she could ignore the visible sign that he was very glad to meet her.
“You don’t want to lie down?” Calvin said hopefully.
“Standing is good,” she said. “You’ll see.”
Layla was tall enough to reach his neck easily, and she licked the spot first, feeling him jerk and gasp. Then she bit, softly, and willed him to be blissful with the pain.
His blood made her soar. Between feedings, she eked out her nutrition by drinking one of the artificial blood drinks, but it was like guzzling Thunderbird instead of champagne.
Over Calvin’s shoulder, Layla kept an eye on Sean, still talking to his donor, who had introduced herself as Sue. Sue had clearly been impressed by Sean, who (though not conventionally handsome) appealed to a certain group of women. The Irish accent, the blade of a face, the long red hair … yes, he had some admirers. When he embraced Sue, she leaned into him. She jerked when he bit, jolted with pleasure. Her arms tightened around Sean, and her eyes shut.
When Sean and Layla finished feeding, almost simultaneously, they each kissed their donors on the cheek. “Keep safe,” Layla said to Calvin, who didn’t seem to be in any hurry to leave. Neither did Sue. Layla sighed inwardly and began herding the donors toward the door, smiling and talking the whole time. Calvin begged her to request him the next time she called the bureau, and Sue pressed her phone number into Sean’s hand.
After Layla locked the door behind them, she turned to Sean, who had only been waiting to be alone with her. When he kissed her, she responded ardently. Coasting high on the infusion of fresh blood, they couldn’t wait to get to the bedroom. The living room floor was good enough.
Layla had learned everything she knew about consensual sex from Sean. Tonight she tried something Abilene, a sex performer, had described. Following Abilene’s advice, she crawled down Sean’s torso to part his legs and licked the skin behind his balls before grazing that spot with her fangs.
Sean’s reaction was nothing short of explosive. Afterward, he gave her a deep kiss and held her. He said, “That was the best sex I’ve had in a hundred years.”
Layla laughed, proud she had made him so happy. She made a mental note to thank Abilene later. Abilene was an expert at her job, and she was the strongest woman (or vampire) that Layla knew. Layla would never have predicted they’d become friends when they’d first met. She’d shied away from the Black Moon people, and she felt ashamed of that now.
As she sat curled up with a book a bit later, Layla, relaxed and boneless, told herself that she’d imagined Sean’s restlessness—he surely loved her.
She could not imagine living without him. It terrified her to think of such a thing. She’d been worrying away at Sean’s earlier statement, and she’d figured out what had concerned Sean when he’d said, “You’d be left alone.”
He didn’t think she could survive.
Layla half-smiled. She recalled a pageant in Memphis, Miss Cotton Boll. She had just come off stage after her talent (dancing, of course), and she’d been dabbing her face with a towel when Carla Summers, Miss Dixie Belle, had launched herself at Layla with a pair of scissors, screaming, “You used my music!” Without hesitation, Layla had pulled up her knee and kicked Carla in the belly with all of her strength, simultaneously throwing her towel in Carla’s face to blind her. One of the pageant moms had caught the whole thing on her phone. In return for Layla’s promise not to prosecute, Carla had retired from the pageant circuit that night.
Layla felt fully capable of defending herself.
* * *
The auditorium was booked for another event the next night, so a general practice was scheduled at the Blue Moon/Black Moon studio. Layla and Sean were in their rehearsal clothes and warming up by the time Thompson and Julie straggled in.
Layla thought of Julie as a friend, but the blonde didn’t seem to be feeling the same warmth. She nodded briefly at Layla’s greeting and crossed the room to warm up at the opposite barre, as far away from Layla as she could get. Everybody has an off night, Layla told herself, refusing to be hurt for so small a reason.
Layla was excited about the practice, which was to be conducted by Feodor, the dance master Sylvia had hired for the Valentine Day exhibition. Sylvia was willing to invest in the future: she saw that the novelty of having vampire dancers at fund-raisers and private parties was subsiding. If this presentation was successful (and the event had already sold out), Sylvia would keep Feodor on staff.
The Russian had been trained classically at the Bolshoi decades ago, and it had stunned all of the Blue Moon dancers when they’d found out he was going to be Abilene’s partner. No one had known th
at the sex performer was a fine ballerina. And none of them knew how Feodor had met Sylvia, who’d only lived a fraction of his life. The vampire was deceptively sleek, an icy blond with pale blue eyes. He carried a cane to practice. He’d slash out with it if he felt a dancer was not working hard enough.
Tonight, Feodor had apparently decided to take their minds off tomorrow night’s opening performance. He led them in a series of combinations. The aged Russian vampire demonstrated steps that Layla had never seen. She doubted anyone had, in decades.
Layla focused intently. From the corner of her eye she saw that Abilene was following Feodor’s instructions with apparent ease, her angular face expressionless. Some of the troupe members were unhappy that a sex performer was getting a plum position on the program, but Layla was sure that Abilene, no matter how she earned her money now, had at some point been an established ballerina.
“You’re lazy, lazy, lazy!” Feodor snarled, whacking Thompson on the back of his thigh.
“Ouch,” Layla whispered sympathetically as Thompson took a position at her right side.
He glared at her. “Better lazy than a leech like you,” he muttered.
Layla’s eyes opened wide, but before she could react to the accusation, Feodor rapped out a new set of instructions. She had to leap (literally) to comply.
Sean had overheard Thompson’s insult. Vampires could hear the merest whisper. As if the evening hasn’t already been stressful enough, Layla thought. Sean’s blue eyes were narrow, his face set in rigid lines as he contained his anger during the class.
When they had a five-minute break, Layla asked, “What the hell was that about? Do you know?”
“I’ll kill the bastard.”
“I don’t understand. Does he think I’m living off you?” She contributed most of her income to their common account, although she put a small sum aside every month to save enough to resume taking night classes. (Continuing her program at the university had not been possible after her death.)
Dancers in the Dark and Layla Steps Up Page 11