Not a pretty sight—he turned his head away, but not before his professional eye had taken in the hideous puffed purple flattened mask of a face: this man had died not from loss of blood, but from having the bridge of his nose smashed back into his brain. It was the first lethal blow they'd taught him at the Academy. He wondered if perhaps he couldn't just stuff the body back into place, make it look like an accident. Maybe put the phone near his—
No, it'd never work: that phone call again, too many hours post mortem for the dead guy to have made it. Nope, back to Plan A: wipe the place down, make sure the body's not found soon. That way all the cops would have, assuming anybody even missed some creep who dosed hookers until after the rent was due, was an empty apartment, a great deal of blood, and a meaningless sequence of outgoing calls, of which his would only be the first. Beats me, officer: some guy yelling roobaroobarooba. They'd probably be a lot more interested in the last call, whoever that turned out to be.
And with the aid of the speed and strength that came to him on blood (he wondered if he'd have had to drink some anyway, just to get the job done, and decided it was probably better not to know), and a pair of rubber gloves from the kitchenette sink, he had the apartment wiped down and the body covered with a sheet in twenty minutes, all to the tune of roobaroobarooba.
"Okay, kiddo, we're almost ready to go here." A few spiky tendrils of tangled purple hair came poking up over the back of the couch, followed by a wide-eyed January. Nick passed her one of the rubber gloves, and a bottle of Visine he'd found in the medicine cabinet. "Here, put this glove on, and don't touch anything with the other hand. I've checked around—there's a back staircase that lets out on the alley. Is that his Buick out back?"
She nodded.
"Okay, I've got his keys out of his pocket." He tossed them to her: she caught them smartly. "Use the Visine first—no sense getting busted on a red-eye rap. I want you to go down first. Go slow, go careful. If you see anybody, or if it looks like anybody's going to be able to see you, come back. If not, unlock the trunk with the key that says Buick—I'll be right behind you with the body."
He opened the door to the hall, then waited behind it to hear if any other doors opened. Hearing none, he looked out, then pointed January towards the back stairs. He wiped the phone clean and waited a full minute, by his watch—no sense trying to keep track of the seconds, not this high on blood—then gathered the corners of the sheet around the head of the conveniently compacted body, and carried it out over his shoulder like Santa Claus's sack.
But the sheet caught on the doorknob, and with the first rip the stressed fabric started to give way. Nick shifted the burden to under his arm and carried the awkward bundle down the stairs like a life-size statue of a seated Buddha.
January had done well—the trunk was open. He tossed his burden in, flipped it over, and tried to close the trunk, but even on its side, the corpse with its awkwardly folded legs was still too high. Nick suspected, as he used his blood strength to force the trunk lid down, that he'd probably be hearing the resulting crunch in his dreams for the rest of his life.
It came as a complete shock to January when Nick turned on her. And it had been going so well up to then. He'd been a little tense, it's true—but then, who wouldn't have been, driving that creep's body around in the trunk of his own Buick, strapping him to his own jack for weight, tossing him into the bay at Point Isabel. Fortunately, the tide was in, and with their combined strength they had been able to toss him a good twenty, thirty yards, jack and all.
A splash in the black water, and then it was gone, and she was feeling ever so much better. As for Nick, he didn't seem all that upset as she drove him back to Albany to pick up the 'Vette—just a little quiet, and high on blood, looking out the window.
She had been assuming that he planned to follow her in the 'Vette while she ditched the Buick someplace deserted. Then, she hoped, if he was half as horny as she was (and how could he not be, high on blood), he'd drive her back to his place, and fuck her like a boy, like a girl, like a whore, like a virgin, fuck her all night and let her fuck him too. She'd have liked that.
But before he climbed out of the Buick back on Solano, he turned to her and said goodbye in a tone that seemed to mean goodbye.
"Aren't you going to follow me so we can ditch this car?" she'd asked, puzzled.
"Ditch it yourself." Coldly—so cold she couldn't believe her ears.
"Where?"
"I don't care. The farther away the better."
"But how will I get back?"
"That's not my problem, January." He seized her forearm tightly. "I've enabled you for the last time."
"Ouch. Hey." She tried to pull her arm away, but strong as she was, when they were both on blood he was stronger.
"Shut up and listen. It took every bit of self-control I could muster not to whack you with that tire iron and throw you into the bay after whoever that was I just helped you dispose of. And I'm still not sure it wouldn't have been the right move. So what I suggest, for both our sakes, is that you drive that sucker as far as you can without looking back—here, do you need money?"
He reached into his pocket, not waiting for an answer, turned her palm up, and shoved a few twenties into it. "Take this, drive as far as you can before dawn, leave the car in a twenty-four-hour supemarket parking lot someplace, and don't hitchhike away from it—just walk—not even to the nearest town, but the next town after that. Got all that?"
She nodded, rendered speechless by her sense of abandonment—again and again and again in her young life—and betrayal.
"Good. Now here's the part to really pay attention to: If I ever see you again—if you ever get within arm's reach of me—I will kill you. I will drive the bridge of your nose back into your brain with the flat of my hand—see, here?" He let go of her arm and flexed his wrist sharply towards her face to show her how the blow would be delivered. She was so stunned she never even flinched. "You've already sucker punched me twice—believe me, it will never happen again. In fact, if you ever even call me again, if you even so much as leave a message on my machine, I will drink enough blood to enable me to hunt you down, and then…"
Suddenly his wrist leapt forward again, the base of his palm stopping a millimeter short of her nose. She still hadn't moved. "Now have you got all that?"
Another nod.
"Good. I don't wish you harm, January—I just want you out of my life." Then he said it again: "Goodbye."
She saw the taillights of the 'Vette swinging right on San Pablo Avenue—right, towards El Cerrito, not left towards Berkeley—and suddenly she knew where he was heading: the Church of the Higher Power. "Fucking idiot," she said aloud—she was talking about herself, though. How could she have forgotten about that minister? What was it, back in January, the last meeting, that Nick had told the fellowship he'd donated sperm to her? She counted on her fingers: February, March, April… Then she realized that the impregnation had taken place at least a month before that.
She started again: January, February, March. This time she reached the ring finger of her right hand in September. She had to think again, squeeze today's date out of the whirlwind of thoughts. Saturday night—no, Sunday. The twentieth, something like that. Nick was either a father, or about to become one.
"Son of a bitch." This time she was referring to Nick, as she slid behind the wheel of the Buick. But it was not until she had passed the El Cerrito Plaza shopping center and turned onto Darling that the significance of the date struck her. Today, tomorrow, whatever, summer would be over. They'd be having the equinox orgy up at Whistler Manor this weekend. And serving baby-blood, no doubt. Suddenly she missed them all terribly, and the deserted feeling, the terrible loneliness she'd been fighting all her life, became unbearable, as if it had somehow slipped inside her, sharp and sweet and painful.
By the time she reached the church, she had it worked out in her mind—and just the working out of it, the focusing of her madly spinning thought processes, had m
ade her feel considerably better.
If Nick had turned her away, then Whistler would take her in—after all, they'd been passing her back and forth all year. But they were having baby-blood at the Manor this weekend. That might be a problem.
Unless of course she brought her own baby.
What a welcome they'd give her then! She could see it all clearly in her mind as she parked the Buick out on Jackson, and tiptoed up the grassy border of the driveway so her feet wouldn't make any noise on the gravel.
Selene would hug her, and take the baby away to prepare it for the ceremony, and Whistler would kiss her on top of the head and whisper in her ear to save him a slot on her dahnce-card that night.
Then she could tell him the best news of all. Anybody could of got you a baby, she'd tell him. But I got you Nick's baby.
Whistler would never send her away again after that.
FOUR
If a good belch is truly a sign that one has enjoyed one's meal, then Leon's ten o'clock feeding must have been the greatest of his life, thought Betty, who had worked out a novel, if effective, program: she would nurse Leon downstairs, then carry him up the stairs over her shoulder—bump/burp, bump/burp, bump/burp.
She dressed him in a footed flannel sleeper—it was a cold night—put him into his crib, turned on the Yertle the Turtle Baby Minder (basically a plastic walkie-talkie with a turtle-shaped microphone unit in the nursery transmitting through an open circuit to a speaker turtle in the parents' bedroom), changed into a warm flannel nightgown herself, and climbed into bed with that rarest of treats, a new Armistead Maupin novel.
But not even Maupin's charms could keep the exhausted mother's eyes open for long. She turned out the light, rolled onto her side with her knees drawn up and both hands pressed warmly between her thighs, palms together—her comfort position—and quickly dropped into the waking doze so familiar to new parents, listening to the peaceful chuff of Leon's breathing through the Yertle on the bedside table.
From there, she must have passed into a deep sleep, for the next thing she knew Nick was in bed beside her, and she hadn't even felt the mattress settle. "Hi," she murmured, still half asleep; on her side with her back to him, she squirmed closer—some sort of thermal tropism, her body seeking the heat of his without her conscious volition.
And his body was warm—pulsing warm: to her surprise he had rolled on his side to spoon with her, snuggled down a little deeper in the bed, and was pressing gently against her from behind. Her eyes opened wide in the darkness at what she was feeling. She hadn't felt it for quite a while, but there was no mistaking the sensation: her nightgown had hiked up, and a hot hard erection poking at one's bare buttocks was not the sort of sense-memory a person ever completely forgets.
Oh yes, she thought, already growing moist. It had been so long. Then she thought she'd better say it out loud, to encourage him—though it didn't feel like he needed much encouragement. "Oh yes," she whispered; then, just in case there was any lingering doubt, she said it again, louder, as she reached behind her and seized his erection in her hand, guiding it towards her.
He had the angle all wrong—then she remembered with whom she was dealing. If he was pretending she was a boy, she realized, then, as much as she wanted him, she didn't want him. She let go, and rolled onto her back. "You have to want me, Nick," she said. "You have to make love to me."
"I do." He passed his hand wonderingly over her heavy breasts, feeling the solid weight of them through the soft flannel. "I will."
"Good." She pulled her nightgown up to her waist, and spread her knees for him; he climbed on, and slipped inside her; as he entered her, she felt her nipples begin leaking, and laughed delightedly. "Here," she whispered, pulling the nightgown up to her neck and guiding his mouth to her breast. "Drink."
"It's so sweet." His voice in the darkness carried a tone of such horny wonder; his cock swelled inside her.
"So sweet," she agreed. "So sweet. You fuck me so sweet."
"Good."
Then he brought her a mouthful of her own milk, and she drank the warm sweetness from his lips as her orgasm began to build. She could feel him tensing. "Come inside me," she whispered. "Oh my sweet Nick, come deep inside me."
Then she wasn't whispering anymore, but moaning, louder and louder, building to an orgasmic series of yelps while he groaned like an old boiler about to blow as he came inside her, as deep as she'd begged him to come—Yertle the Turtle turned green with envy.
They were lying next to each other in afterglow when the phone rang, startling them both. Betty fumbled around the bedside table until she found the receiver. " 'Lo? What? Oh, Psalms 121:8. 'Kay. Bye."
"ADT?" said Nick.
"Yes, you must have set off the alarm."
"Fat lot of good it'd do now—I must have gotten here half an hour ago."
"Unless it wasn't you."
Not a fun thought. They both held their breath, listening. "I don't hear anything," whispered Nick. And if I don't hear anything, believe me, there's nothing to hear, he thought, although of course he couldn't say it aloud.
"I don't either."
A few minutes passed, and then a few more—Betty had almost fallen asleep again—before she realized what was so terribly wrong with silence: she should have been hearing the soft sound of Leon's breathing. She sat up then, and leaned closer to the Yertle the Turtle speaker next to the phone. She was perhaps already in denial: the only possibility she was as yet willing to consider was that Yertle's batteries had run down.
Noting with a sick sensation that the little red light was still on, she reminded herself as she climbed out of bed that it could be the other turtle, the transmitter, that had run down. When she reached the nursery, the first place she forced her eyes to look was not at the open nursery window, nor at the empty crib, but at that stupid green plastic turtle with its steady little red battery indicator glowing.
Yertle was working just fine: back in the bedroom, Nick heard Betty's anguished cry over the intercom as clearly as if she were still in bed beside him.
Chapter 9
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ONE
The terrible scene burned in January's mind as she drove: high in the branches of the live oak she had watched through the window as Nick rolled onto that fat minister in the dark. She hadn't watched them for long, though. After all, she had a job to do…
She'd swung easily over to the nursery window, forced it open, squeezed through, taken the baby from his (sex wasn't hard to guess—blue all over) crib and placed him in a baby basket she found on the floor of the nursery, then scrawled a note on the wall with her black lipstick. Nick had to know who'd taken his baby, and what would be done to it, otherwise it wouldn't really count as her revenge this time.
Happy Equinox from January was the message she'd decided on. But she changed her mind and smeared out all the letters after the capital J; then, with the baby basket over her arm, she'd simply trotted down the stairs and exited via the kitchen door.
But now, driving east on 80, she wished she'd found the nursery first, and never seen Nick and the minister. It wasn't only the sight of them fucking missionary style that rankled her so, but what she'd heard through the window. "You have to want me, you have to make love to me."
And she understood suddenly that Nick had never wanted her, January, and never really fucked her, either: only what he saw when he closed his eyes and pretended.
But when she glanced down at the baby in his basket on the seat next to her, sleeping all peaceful and quiet with sweet little miniature lips and his eyelids fluttering, wrapped up snug in his sleeper and his blue blankie, she realized she couldn't carry her anger at Nick over to little Doofus here.
Wasn't his fault his father was such an asshole—even if he was the one who was going to have to pay blood for it.
Nick still had the dead man's Visine in the pocket of his fleece-lined Levi jacket. He gave himself a booster dose in the bathroom while Betty dressed. He had already decided to te
ll her as little as possible about his own, admittedly pivotal, role in this ongoing horror—he could feel guilty about it later, he reasoned: right now the truth would only get in the way.
Whistler's part in all this was something Nick had been chewing over since Betty's first scream. He didn't think his old friend and rival was involved directly—not after their warm phone call, and then the christening gift—but it wasn't farfetched to picture it as an extension of Whistler's original scheme, either. He might have seen Nick's sobriety as a threat.
Or perhaps the idea had just tickled his sense of humor. In any case, he'd fooled Nick before—repeatedly, and over a period of years. Where Whistler was concerned, Nick could be sure of nothing.
Scratch that: he could be sure of a few things. If January were indeed bringing Leon to the Manor (if not, then he was already dead, which was unthinkable), and if Nick and Betty got the cops involved, and if the cops somehow attempted to surround the Manor, or Tac squad their way in, the vampires would have had plenty of warning: no matter how good you were, you didn't sneak up on a vampire on blood unless you were a vampire on blood yourself.
And in that case, whether he was behind the kidnapping or not, there was no way on earth Whistler would ever let himself be caught with… with…
Faced with the choice of completing that thought with the word Leon or the words the body, Nick let it drop. When he emerged from the bathroom, Betty was just coming out of the bedroom wearing a T-shirt under a pair of the Can't Bust 'Em overalls favored by nursing mothers.
"I just got off the phone with ADT," she reported. "The alarm came in at 11:08, so she has about a half-hour head start on us."
"Make that up in the 'Vette easy. Grab a jacket, she handles better with the top down."
Betty didn't bother setting the church security system as they left—with Leon gone, there was nothing more that could be stolen from her.
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