Crimson Kiss

by Trisha Baker

Meghann squinted at it. The writing was quite heavy, and a bit difficult to read with the elaborate, strangely shaped letters. It invited Meghann to accompany Charles to Ireland for the "Yuletide" holidays.

  "This isn't a temporary respite," Charles told her. "We mean to offer you sanctuary from Lord Baldevar… if you want it."

  Meghann was stunned. In two days, her life was changing. Who were these strange people who offered her an escape? She didn't care—she would have accepted a home with Lucifer if it meant a chance to get away. "I accept."

  The phone rang in the sitting room. Charles excused himself.

  He came back in a few minutes, obviously upset. "Meghann, we have a bit of a crisis on our hands."

  "What?"

  "I don't have time to explain everything, but our meeting was planned. My master lured Simon away. He intended to give us time to speak. But now Simon has injured Paul… found him in his lonely spot. I must go to him, help him."

  "Of course."

  "I want to take you with me, but I can't. It would be dangerous for you to be near Simon." Charles pulled out a huge black steamer trunk. "Meghann, under no circumstances are you to return to that town house. There could be a trap. In fact, you are not to stay in New York one more night. I want you to crawl into that trunk before sunrise. The hotel has instructions to ship it to my master's home in Ballnamore. Don't worry; there are airholes at the side. Promise me you'll be in that trunk."

  "I swear," she told him, a bit dazed by all the turmoil.

  Charles threw on his overcoat, and kissed her on the cheek. "I'll see you in Ballnamore."

  "Charles?" she called before he left. "Would it be all right if I left the hotel tonight? I want to go to the cemetery and visit my father."

  "You know where he's buried?"

  "He and my mother have a plot together—I've been there a thousand times."

  "I don't see the harm in it. Just make sure you're in that trunk by sunrise." He came back in, and hugged her fiercely. "Good luck."

  * * *

  CHAPTER NINE

  « ^ »

  Meghann entered Calvary Cemetery through one of the side streets, where all you had to do was climb over the rock facade to gain entrance.

  She'd never been in a graveyard at night—although according to movies, it should be her home away from home since becoming a vampire. It was very peaceful and still. She thought it might be the only place in the city where you could get total peace and quiet. Vampires could see as well as cats in the dark—she admired the round photographs of the deceased carved into headstones, the fresh flowers and rosary beads some people put by the graves.

  She walked with no hesitation. Her father had taken her to visit her mother's plot one Saturday a month. They would bring roses, and Jack would tell her stories about the mother she hardly remembered.

  Meghann remembered that one time she admired the view of the skyline from her mother's plot. Her father had told her, "I wanted your mom and I to have a pretty place when we were gone. It would be boring to just stare at a tree or somebody's rooftop. Now we've got Manhattan to keep us entertained."

  Meghann found the grave, and thought the view was even better at night. Two bare trees a few feet away from the grave encircled the twinkling lights of the skyline. To the right, there were a few houses and on the left she could see the dome top to First Calvary Chapel.

  She knelt down and ran her hand over the large oval stone with a stone cross carved on top and a trail of vines carved on the side. On the bottom of the tombstone, there was a small opening carved out of the stone. Protected by a small gate were a votive candle and a statue of the Virgin. Meghann opened the gate and lit the candle with the lighter Charles had given her.

  She touched the two inscriptions, one already somewhat worn away and the other recently chiseled: MEGHANN FLYNN O'NEILL, 1893-1929, BELOVED MOTHER and JOHN PAUL O'NEILL, 1890-1957, BELOVED FATHER.

  She smiled at the inscriptions. "You sure were beloved, Daddy." She wiped the tears away and said with a grin, "I didn't bring any flowers 'cause I knew you'd want something better." She reached into her purse and pulled out a fifth of Jameson Irish Whiskey.

  While she poured it over the grave, she said, "I remember what you told us kids. You said we shouldn't let you get thirsty."

  Meghann knelt down again at the foot of the grave, and stared into the candle flame. "I know I felt you last night, Daddy, and I'm glad for that. But I couldn't go away without telling you the whole story. I know you must have wondered why I never visited, why all you got from me was that one letter Simon made me write and some lousy Christmas cards.

  "Do you want to know something, Daddy? It's not that he ever forbid me to see you; it was that I didn't think I could see you or talk to you. I didn't want you to see me with him. I guess I was always afraid if I looked at you, if you hugged me… I thought the whole thing would come pouring out. And I didn't want that because I was sure you'd hate me, be repulsed by me."

  The cemetery was so quiet Meghann felt quite detached from the world—it was like she'd found one of the fairy knolls her father used to tell her stories about. The isolation allowed her to focus her thoughts. She continued talking to her father.

  "You would be right to be repulsed. God knows I'm pretty repulsed by the thought of all I did. Do you know I can't even count the number of people I've killed so I could stay alive?" She didn't say aloud what she feared most—that her soul was condemned to eternal damnation for what she'd done. "And I never gave Johnny a second thought. I was a vampire, Daddy, plain and simple. I sucked people's blood and I didn't care one bit about them—their lives, the people who'd be hurt when they were gone. Nothing mattered except drinking blood… and Simon."

  Just thinking of him enraged her. She glared at the headstone. "Someone just told me you don't have to kill people to drink their blood. Do you know what that means, Daddy? That bastard let me commit murder, had me thinking it was the only way I could survive." She laughed bitterly. "Oh, Daddy, I swear you wouldn't have recognized me if I did see you. Your little Maggie afraid to open her mouth, getting on her hands and knees before her master. Does that sound like me? I used to have a mouth and a temper… and I was never afraid to use them."

  Meghann found some rocks by a neighboring grave. She started launching them at the tree, careful not to strike any of the graves. "Damn him!" she yelled. "I know it's awful, but do you want to know the truth? The dead people aren't what kills me. It's what he did to me! What he changed me into—a doll, a toy. That's all I'm supposed to be. Half the time I don't even pick out my own damn clothes. For thirteen years, I haven't been myself."

  Throwing rocks was helping—so was that last thought. "Daddy? That's what's different these past two nights—I feel like myself again. Like I can say and do and think what I please. Well, to hell with Simon—I'm going to this Alcuin's tomorrow and I never have to be in his presence again."

  The still quality in the cemetery changed abruptly. The quiet stopped being soothing and became ominous. Something else was in the cemetery with her—something malignant.

  Meghann became absolutely still. She turned around very slowly, and saw Simon standing behind her.

  How long had he been there? What had he heard? "You're back," she said unnecessarily. How had he known where to find her? Trevor, Meghann realized with a sinking heart. If Simon had called home and Trevor informed his master of Meghann's reaction to her father's death, Jack O'Neill's grave would be the first place Simon went to look for his missing consort.

  "Will you come into my arms and welcome me? Or would you care to finish that treacherous soliloquy? Go on, child—spit on my gift to you and tell me it's a curse."

  If you don't stand up to him now, you never will, she told herself. Falter and you'll be right back to being his timid little plaything. She grabbed Simon's face with both her hands.

  He gazed down at her with amused speculation, and she kissed him firmly on the lips. "Master," she told him in a poisonously swee
t tone, "that is the last kiss you get from me."

  Simon yanked her hands off his face, and twisted them behind her back. It hurt, but she refused to give him the satisfaction of crying out. Then he kissed her so hard she could feel his blood teeth. She tried to twist away, lost her footing, and struggled to her knees.

  "Now that," he told her smoothly, "is the position I want to see you in. If you beg me for forgiveness, I'll show you mercy."

  "You should be begging me for forgiveness!" she yelled with her old temper. "How dare you keep my father's death from me! Who the hell do you think you are? Go away—we're through!" He released one of her hands, and backhanded her viciously across the face.

  "Hit me all you want—you don't scare me!"

  "I have not yet tried to scare you, little girl." Simon spoke in such a sinister whisper that her skin broke out in gooseflesh, but she refused to give up. She tried to use her free hand to punch him in the groin, but he grabbed her hand in a steel grip.

  "Try that again," he told her in the same rancorous tone, "and I shall break every bone in your pretty little body. Then I will drain you of blood and leave you here to die when the sun rises."

  He let go of her other hand, and she stood up shakily. She had no doubt he meant what he said, and that any attempt to harm him would be fruitless.

  That didn't mean she wasn't going to try to gain her freedom. Defiantly she raised her head and gave him her most disdainful look. "You can break every bone in my body twice over, and you still won't get me to love you."

  "Keep trying my patience, Meghann, and you'll find out all I can do to wipe that self-righteous look off your face."

  "Why does the truth try your patience?" she asked boldly.

  "Have you lost your mind to speak to me this way? Some cretinous boy-lover fills your head with sanctimonious notions and you forget all I have done for you?"

  "How could I forget all you've done?" she asked venomously. "You took the sun away, along with my innocence, and turned me into a depraved bloodthirsty killer like you! And if that wasn't bad enough, you kept my father's illness from me."

  "You ceased to be the daughter of some coarse Irish peasant when my blood started flowing through you. As your creator, I am all to you—you may put no one before me. I gave you everything when I made you my consort. Is this how you repay me, you ungrateful heir-lion?"

  "Don't you call my father a peasant!" she yelled, shaken by his lunatic thoughts. "And I don't want anything from you, so go find some other girl to fuck you!"

  "I will rip that viperous tongue from your mouth if you dare use language like that to me again." Lightning fast, he whipped his hand into her hair and lifted her off the ground. "I do not care what you want from me. I want so much more from you, pet. And we will start with what you promised me—love and obedience."

  "You can't force someone to love you."

  Simon laughed—a chilling sound that had no humanity or joy in it. It was like listening to a demon laugh. "Pretty child, I have spoiled you if you do not know that I can force anything I want from you. But the time has come to rectify that error."

  In the dark, she could see his amber eyes glinting with fierce malevolence. I'm so scared, she thought as he leaned toward her. Oh, God, I don't want to be here.

  And she found herself facedown in sand. Dazed, she pulled herself up and glanced around. When she saw the dark silhouette of the roller coaster, she knew exactly where she was. Why, I'm on Rockaway Beach—this is the exact spot where my father always took me. She had glanced at that roller coaster a thousand times from the water.

  Wait a minute, she thought in growing amazement. How did I get here? I traveled… by myself, she thought with glee.

  How had this happened? Of course—fight or flight! She'd learned about that in college. When you were threatened, your nervous system responded by either fighting or escaping. Her panic gave her the ability to travel the astral plane by herself. It hadn't been like those times she'd been with Simon—it had gone by too fast for her to remember anything.

  Anyway, what does it matter, her practical side wanted to know. The important thing is you got here, safe from Simon. At least she hoped that was true. She looked around the deserted beach—she seemed to be alone.

  Then she remembered what Simon had told her—you couldn't fly to a place you'd never been before. And she was fairly certain he'd never been to Rockaway.

  She started dancing and shouting with joy. She was free, free, free! I did it, she thought with exultation, I got away from the bastard! He can't follow my here—I'm free!

  Meghann walked up to the boardwalk. She consulted her watch: three o'clock. Well, there was no way to leave New York City tonight—it would take her at least an hour to get back to the city. She sat down on the boardwalk, enjoying the view of the moonlight on the water.

  Meghann considered her situation. Sure, she'd mentioned Rockaway and the carefree summers she'd spent there to Simon in passing but it had been a long time ago—hopefully he'd forgotten. At any rate, it was unlikely he'd find her tonight or even tomorrow if she left Rockaway immediately after sunset. Therefore, it seemed logical to spend the day here, and leave New York the next evening. She thought she definitely shouldn't go back to the Algonquin—when Simon found her at Calvary, he knew about her meeting Charles. She might be walking into a trap if she attempted to get to that trunk. Well, all right. She still knew where Charles's master was—Ireland. And she had that money she'd taken from Simon. She would purchase her own trunk tomorrow and make the necessary arrangements.

  The only thing that worried her was Charles telling her Simon could find her because they shared a link. Did that mean it wouldn't matter if she hid in Timbukto—Simon could always find her? No, there has to be some sort of limit… doesn't there? She decided since she couldn't do anything about it, she wouldn't worry.

  So, she thought to herself, what do I do now? It's awfully late. She walked a few blocks and found a bar, The Black Bottom, that was still open. Well, I escaped Satan's spawn tonight; I think I owe myself a drink.

  She walked in, and saw that the bar was empty except for a young bartender and an elderly man who was talking the ear off of the bored but tactful barkeep.

  She sat on a stool by the elderly man.

  "Does your father know you're out this late, lassie?" the elderly man demanded.

  "What's the matter with you, Charlie?" the bartender spoke with an Irish lilt. "Anyone can tell plain as the nose on his face she's after leaving a jealous husband."

  "How did you know that?" Meghann asked.

  "Ah, well, when you've kept bar for a few years, you see everything. It's in your eyes, darlin'… You look mad enough to spit and at the same time your eyes keep dartin' around like you're expectin' your man to storm in after you any second." The bartender grinned, and stuck out his hand to her. "I'm Roy Lynch, darlin', and don't ya be worryin'… I'll throw the bum out of here if he tries to make you leave by force."

  Meghann smiled back, and shook his hand. "I don't suppose you'd have malt whiskey back there?"

  "Sure, and isn't this a good Irish bar? I have what you need—and I ain't discussin' the whiskey, mind." Roy gave her a lascivious smile, and poured a double shot.

  Meghann appraised him—not especially good-looking with that sharp nose and thin lips, but nice enough with his curly black hair and blue eyes. Plus a wiry body with good, strong arms—he'd do very well. She returned his leer with one of her own, and raised her glass high. "Erin go bragh." She took the whiskey in one swallow, and placed it on the bar. "Hit me."

  Charlie and Roy gaped at her. "And where did you learn to drink like that?" Charlie asked. "One gulp and not a gasp or choke from you."

  "A performance like that rates a free drink," Roy said when he set the refilled glass in front of her.

  "Let me buy you a drink instead," Meghann told him. "And one for you too," she told Charlie.

  "Well, I'm not drinkin' with anyone whose name I don't know," Roy rep
lied, bottle poised to pour.

  "Meghann O'Neill."

  "A good Irish name." Charlie approved heartily and thanked her for his drink.

  Meghann and Roy chatted amiably until closing. "How mad are you at that husband, darlin'?" Roy asked around four A.M..

  "He's just a boyfriend," Meghann said. "Why?"

  "Well, darlin', what do you say to a drink at my apartment?"

  A ridiculous thought struck her. In a way, she was still a virgin. She'd only slept with a vampire, never with a mortal man. Wasn't it about time to find out if there was a difference? And maybe she could find out if she was capable of drinking blood without killing her host.

  At his apartment, Roy gave her a drink. After a few minutes, he started kissing her, and then they were in the bedroom. Roy mauled her breasts in a manner he seemed to think was designed to elicit pleasure for about thirty seconds, and then rammed himself into her. After a few thrusts, he screamed, "Holy Jesus Christ!" and collapsed on top of her.

  Well, Meghann thought sourly, I guess I have to give Simon his due—the bastard sure knows how to make love. Is this what most men are like? Wham, bam, thank you, ma'am.

  Roy rolled off her, and gave her a sleepy smile. "Want a cigarette, darlin'?"

  "Sure."

  They smoked silently, and then Roy yawned. "You wore me out, darlin'. Stay, if you want—I'll make you breakfast." Then he put his cigarette out and went to sleep.

  That was it? Meghann thought incredulously. Simon liked to make love for hours, usually four or five times in a night. Well, vampires probably had more stamina. Still, that seemed awfully quick. And what did he have to be so tired about? He'd hardly done anything.

  He started snoring—he was deeply asleep. Meghann decided that if he couldn't satisfy one desire, he could probably satisfy another. She pushed his thighs apart gently, and used her blood teeth to drink from the artery in his left thigh.

  Roy sat up and screamed, "Hey!"

  "Sleep," she told him and he dropped off without another word.